Save the chicken!

After staging a mutiny late last year -- and realizing it wouldn't get them anywhere -- our chickens eventually returned to their egg-laying ways. Or, at least, most of them have. The three Easter eggers have been steady -- if not daily -- providers of greenish-shelled eggs. The yellow one -- the Buff Orpington -- has been moody and too frequently broody, although when she is laying, she gives a daily offering.

But the red one. Sigh. Last summer when all those shenaningens were going on with the raccoons, she must have somehow escaped the clutches of a masked bandit during one of the raids because the following morning, we found her with most of the feathers on her back end scratched off. She hasn't really been the same since. Previously, she was a great layer, but over the past months, her egg shells have gotten softer and she's slowly diminished in her production capacity so that now she doesn't lay at all.

In my book, a non-producing chicken has overstayed her welcome, and I've been looking for ways to, um, "do away" with her. I've asked several friends if they'd like to, um, "help" with the job but haven't found any takers. Most have assured me it's an ugly job and one I don't want to get involved with.

And then I thought about just leaving her outside the cage one night and inviting the raccoons to finish what they started. But then, as I was reading the daily chapter from Proverbs to the boys one morning, I came across this verse:

A righteous man has regard for the life of his animal. (Proverbs 12:10)

And I decided I should probably forgo the raccoon-bait idea.

Seth has flatly refused to participate in my offing attempts. In fact, he flatly refuses to believe Red's egg-laying days are passed. Whenever I bring up that fact that we have a freeloader on our hands, he quietly says, "She's not dead yet. She's getting better." And he's trying his best to make it true. In fact, in order to help her along, he bought vitamins for the chickens the other day. Vitamins. For the chickens. Seth.

That's my kind-hearted, gentle husband for ya.

However, since the vitamins don't seemed to have helped her (i.e., she's laid no egg lately), I'm still plotting her demise, but haven't figured out the right course of action yet. I'm open to any and all suggestions . . . .