Rough Chicken Morning

Last night when I went to lock the chickens up for the night I noticed one of them was not walking well. She is one I've been watching for awhile but it appears as if she took a turn for the worse. She wouldn't come into the coop so I picked her up and set her in the door, she just sat there. She was light as a feather. I had to go into the coop and get her out of the doorway so I could lock it and she fell over. So this morning after finding her hiding behind the feed can, still alive but not better at all, we decided to cull her. (That's the nice term for putting her out of her misery.) I felt bad. It's the first time we've had to do this.

In the other coop we had a "near" tragedy. I went in to feed them (the new flock) and found one chicken wedged in the wall of the coop, which is made out of pallets. She got wedged in between two closely placed 1x3's in the wall. (picture below of the wall) Stupid bird could have walked just 3 inches to the other side of the 1x3 to easily escape but decided she needed to get through a 2inch space. Probably scrambled hard all night long to get through there. She was so worn out she couldn't even hold her head up any longer. Her head was through and one wing...in a 2 inch space!! I didn't think logically and tried to stuff her back through, it felt horrible. But then that didn't work so I ran to get James. He walks out and simply says, "Pry the board off. " DUH! So 2 minutes later I had the board free and she flopped out. In shock and exhausted beyond belief she looked nearly dead. But last I was out there she was perked up and eating. I'm headed out to check on her again.
Phew!! What a morning.

This is the wall that has the close together boards. She was wedged between the last 2 on the left. I pried the middle board out. Maybe I should go pry off a couple more close together ones.