The story starts last night, when I couldn't find our oldest laying hen, Cloudy. After a while of walking the yard, I found her snuggled in a little nest in the bushes near our stone wall. I picked her up and carried her home to sleep in the safe coop, noticing a questionable poop and her very calm state. She didn't seem in pain but I thought she might be egg-bound again, as she was last year.
Well, sadly, this morning she was lying motionless on the floor of the coop. I called the two younger children to say good bye.
We talked about how we don't know exactly how old she was, since we got her at an auction. She was molting when we bid on her, and looking bedraggled. We just needed a warm body to fill in space in our coop after a few losses. She has turned out to be such a reliable hen, friendly (but not overly affectionate), good at getting out of the way of predators (once it took me a whole night to locate her in her secret hide-out under the coop after a doggy scare), and pretty to look at in her snow white feathers, like a picture book hen. We will miss her!
The next generation of layers is providing solace to the middle, who was the most upset.
Sorry to hear about Cloudy. Even in death, an animal provides solace to the kids, if the moms allow them, of course, to say goodbye and to touch.
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