Oh god. It is the year of the dog, after all. We have lost another flock of chickens to dogs. The worst of it is that it was probably our dog. The entire dome is vacant but for mulch and feathers. If it was Bono, he killed them all, and carried them all off to some secret hiding spot. No doubt the smell will come up in a couple of days and we'll get more clues.
In the meanwhile Bono is tied up in the tractor shed, and Lorinda is asking around to see if anyone wants to a adopt a big black dog, who is actually a lovely dog when he isn't being genocidal...
Of course it may not have been Bono, but all circumstantial evidence points towards the big brute...
So, what to do? We have sort of decided to circle the wagons so to speak, and make one really solid chook pen that hopefully will be dog proof and will prevent the chooks from escaping, where the current flock is preparing for the microcitrus orchard. It kind of sucks to design in reaction to such factors, but there you are. It will necessarily mean a reduction in our overall poultry flock, but they'll breed again I suppose...