We posted several times about a chicken that has been eating eggs in the hen house. This has been going on for quite some time. Aggravating, yes. Not only was this chicken eating eggs that WE could be eating, but when eggs were cracked and eaten, the yolk would get on uneaten eggs, making them difficult and quite time-consuming to clean. Countless hours over the past several years have been spent cleaning eggs.
We tried several tactics and remedies to try to resolve this issue - all to no avail. The best thing we could do in order to save the eggs and ensure that we had some to eat, was to go out to the hen house numerous times a day and pick up eggs and put them in a basket out of reach of the beaked bandit. By doing this, we were somewhat successful, but oftentimes, we were too late.
It has been said that if you play with fire, you're going to get burned. Well, Tricia walked out one day week before last to gather eggs and lo and behold, she spotted a Rhode Island Red Hen cracking and eating a just laid egg. Tricia quickly grabbed the egg eater and put her in solitary confinement.
We kept her here for a few days while checking the egg production. The next day there were NO broken eggs. The day following - no broken eggs. And so forth and so on for a week. In fact, where we were previously gathering no eggs to 3 or 4 eggs each day (and those eggs were dirty, sticky, yolk-covered eggs), now we began collecting 14 to 17 eggs a day! Beautiful, clean eggs at that!
A trial was held and due to proof beyond reasonable doubt, the perpetrator was tried by a jury of her peers and found guilty. She was transported out of her cell in general population and into her new cell on death row while she waited out the appeal process. During the next week, there continued to be no broken eggs.
The sentencing phase of the trial took place on a sunny Saturday morning. The egg eater was found guilty of numerous counts of... (gasp) cannibalism. Stern justice was meted out by the judge/executioner so this time of crime would be abolished from the hen house, thereby sending a message to other copy-cats that this would not be tolerated. The egg eater was hung by her feet, bled out, scalded and plucked, while the barnyard inhabitants watched.
The egg eater was pronounced dead at 11:28 am.
She was not buried. Instead, she was put into the deep-freeze and will become the main protein source in our next Chicken and Sausage Gumbo. The eater will become the eaten. Poetic justice, indeed.
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