Quite a ruckus at the chicken coop this morning. My resident bobcat came calling. Above is a picture of the handsome creature last fall when I first spied him/her attempting to get a free dinner.
When I broached this event with fellow chicken lovers, they offered up all kinds of suggestions about what to do; calling county animal control to ask for a trap to relocate the cat, spreading around mountain lion urine to scare it away or even poison. Are you kidding me?
I was so darned excited about seeing the bobcat. It was a sign that there was still a little bit of wildness in the neighborhood.
I am lucky though. We have a very strong chicken coop. We lovingly dubbed it the “Fort Knox” version. Protected underground, over the top–you get the idea. We built it that way because we had seen the bobcat before we got chickens. It would hang near gopher feeding holes looking for its own feeding.
My neighbor has lost flocks of chickens to raccoons , bobcats and who knows what else. One time he was working in the garden and a bobcat took one of his chickens in broad daylight.
I figure having chickens in the country is a system of checks and balances. Sometimes the bobcat gets one and sometimes…more times than not, they are thwarted.
I have nine chickens, down from 14. We gave some away to the neighbor who had lost his, one was eaten by a visiting dog and the rest, yet to be dinner for some wild creature. We had these nine for about six months. Do you think it’s okay to name them now?
