My Darling Clementine

WARNING! NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART (OR STOMACH!)

When we decided to raise chickens I did a lot of research on the care and whatnot of them. I was not, however, prepared for the chicken drama and dare I say heartache of these past few weeks. We have four chickens, four different breeds and therefore four different sizes. Little did I know that this would be a major problem. My chicken, Clementine, is the smallest one. She was constantly being picked on by the others and was definitely at the bottom of the pecking order. The others had gotten her a few times, even drawing blood here and there but nothing out the ordinary.

A week and a half ago we went to get the eggs and Clementine literally came staggering to me through the nesting box with one of the chickens at her heels, pecking at her backside. I picked her up and to our horror her entire backside was pecked to a pulp. I won't go into more detail than that so I don't get any dry heaves! The poor thing was being cannibalized, something I NEVER read about in all my research but is actually quite common among chickens but usually in larger flocks.

We made Clementine a makeshift bed of straw in a container in the laundry room and didn't think she'd make it the first night. I wouldn't have minded if she didn't because she was suffering so. She stood in the same spot for 2 days straight while we tried to nurse to back to health. I had a friend ask her dad (a vet in MO) what we should do and he said that even if she did heal, we could never reintroduce her to the flock because they would just go after her again.

So I decided to put an ad up on Craigslist to see if someone would take her...Hoping we wouldn't have to take more drastic measures.

Thank heavens we live in Seattle where people love their pets so much (more than kids!). I was inundated with emails from people genuinely offering to take her into their flocks. One email in particular stood out to me- a wonderful lady that usually takes in birds and bunnies through the humane society that have been abused or neglected. She offered to take her to a vet and get her healed. The kids and I met her down south that next morning and passed Clementine onto her. She has kindly kept us informed of her condition since then. Clementine was in really bad shape but seems to be on the mend. She's on antibiotics and gets iodine baths twice a day. She even sleeps inside with her new owner and will for a few more weeks. She's a tough cookie that one!

And then there were three... :(

Update: Clementine passed away last Wednesday night. The wonderful person that took her in notified us and we picked her up today and buried her in our backyard. They gave us a pot of primrose and we put that on top of her grave. I had no idea how attached I would get to her, I literally lost it when Rene was explaining to me how she died! Clementine really was the sweetest thing and just had such a rough go of it.

Luckily the remaining three have been getting along famously and it looks as though the pattern won't continue. If it ever happens again we will know what to do this time.