A Brutal Tragedy

I just heard that this morning, a friend of mine suffered a tragedy. Janet lives in the suburbs of Southern California like us, and has two backyard laying hens. She is the one who introduced me to the idea. We visited her home last summer and met her two beautiful birds, and shortly thereafter, got two of our own.

This morning, she heard a racket in her backyard, and arrived outside just in time to see about 40 crows attacking her chickens. They killed both of them, flying off with one and leaving the other in the yard.

I never knew crows hunted in packs, or could be so brutal. The scientific name for a large grouping of crows is a "murder of crows", and I guess this term bears some truth.

I am so sad for Janet and her family. What a horrific thing to happen. If you keep chickens in your yard, it seems it's not just coyotes and feral cats you have to watch out for.