3 Dead 3 Missing & 1 Survivor - 3rd chick distaster this year ! - I'll have to take the blame for too much steemit time

• Woke up this morning to another round of carnage. While sipping my morning coffee and checking on steemit at the crack of dawn.

The chickens start making a bunch of noise and that's kind of typical as the Roosters like to get an early morning piece of tail from the hens and usually a little cackling and cawing as this activity takes place.
But Johana wakes up and says " Cody go check on the chickens see what's going on ".

The devastated family

• For over a month now steemit has been controlling a bunch of my time and I've been neglecting my farm duties. Today my chicks paid the price.

A few months back a Cat had gained entry to our chicken coop and ate 25 chicks, I know because I saw it 2 times and caught it once inside. I thought the area was pretty secure with chicken wire which is fine for chickens but not so secure to predators.
And this cat actually scaled the wire and climbed in over the top gap, and when I showed up it was freaking out.
When I opened the door, after a few times trying to climb out came running at the open door, Which I slammed into its head and it bounced back, trying to scale the wire again.
So the second time I opened the door it tried again, And this time I waited a bit longer to slam the door with more force and the cat actually broke right through not only chicken wire but a second layer of 1" mesh as well that was only nailed into the wood frame.
It took off running with Cheeta right behind into a backfield and up a tree Cheeta barking away sitting down below, she loves to chase cats, And I don't know if she ever caught 1 but she seems to throttle back a bit when I see her chasing them.
Maybe got a nose full of claws before LOL.

• I might add that Iguanas can give a nasty bite and have claws too, But yet here is proof that Cheeta can catch them Here.

Im fuming mad and go into the field with her and see the cat sitting in the tree not far up. So I pick up a stick and throw it at it, She jumps down and the chase is on again, Cheeta in hot pursuit and I go back to the house.
I'm not sure what happened but the cat has not returned ( that I know of ). Until Today!

• I'm just getting started raising chickens and want to some day get up to 200 eggs a day. Time to invest more into chicken safety.

So I invest in 300' of chainlink fence, A welder and everything else needed to get the job done.
I'll do a blog on Panama fence lines and the like soon ( it deserves a blog on its own ).

Here is the area before we got started

Her is what it looks like Today

• Now Cheeta has had puppies a couple of months ago and I've already decided to build a nice dog house in the chicken area. 1 or 2 of the new puppies will have the job of sleeping there at night.

In fact they sometimes are kept there now if thier being pains in the ass in a seperate area I've already created also doubling as a small chick refuge to eat or get away from the larger chickens ( which can be rather mean to the little ones ), As they can run right through chainlink fence.

• Ok well, how far have I digressed? not too much I think, Stay focused Cody LOL

Now off to do my duties and finnish the coop once and for all. I needed to get another 30' of 10 gauge wire to weld the rebar along the roof and put in the last 8-10 inces of mesh right to the top. I'm sure that's how the cat got in.
So off to town to get the material to do it and leave steemit for a while LOL

• I hope you enjoyed the story, I look forward to writing many more for you :-)

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