Massacre!

I worked on the barn most of the day today. Took a break this morning and went to the gym but got back on it after lunch. Things progressed well. I got the top lifted up a little higher and pulled a bunch of stuff out from under it. I got all the ladders and scaffolding gathered up and put away. I started taking the remaining wall sections apart, pulling all the nails out of them and stacking the lumber up. I knocked off about 4:30 and went for a little bike ride to see how the chest was performing after all the work on the barn and the gym. Not too bad as it happens.

So I go in the house, get cleaned up and about 6:00 I head out to the chicken coop with some scraps for the chickens. I'm feeling good. It's a beautiful day, I got a lot done on the barn and I got a little bike ride in as well. I get out to the coop and a mink is inside the fence. It had already killed 8 of the 10 little chickens. Just bit their necks and then tried to drag them through the fence. We've never had any trouble with minks in the past but we damn sure have got trouble now. I boarded up the remaining two little ones and the old rooster in the coop and, sure enough, I looked out there later and the mink was trying to dig under the board and get inside to finish the job.

I've seen minks in the ditch at the other end of the property but I don't know how this one figured out that we had a fresh batch of little ones. I've got two outside cats and there's a feral one that started showing up here not too long ago. Apparently cats aren't much of a deterrent to a mink. I'll get some finer mesh wire and string around the bottom of the fence next week. I'm not sure how good a mink is at climbing. I might have to go all the way to the top, which is about 5 foot. The top is already covered to keep the hawks and owls out.

Man, I feel terrible. I understand the law of the jungle and all that but it's also my job to look out for my stock. I've had chickens for quite a few years here and I've never lost a single one to a critter. I tightened things up around the bottom of the wire the other day before transferring them, so I thought I was good. I might have to go chicken shopping after I secure the fence. Might do a little stakeout and sniper action after I let the other two back out in the yard first, however.

The orchid in the photo was a gift from a long lost relative that is blooming again. The people of Minot, N. Dakota are experiencing terrible floods. Likewise, China. There is still lots of cleanup work locally from the big storm that hit here, life in the food chain remains brutal, but the flowers still bloom and the weather today was the best of the year. It's hard to make sense of it all, sometimes.

More rain in the forecast that's going to be followed up with some hot temperatures. In fact, the weatherman said close to 100 degrees next Friday. As Tom Waits sang, all this crap "is puttin' the Vise Grips on my mental health".