The Missing Dozen

Yesterday, All Bright Sanitation (828.894.5009) came to swap out the big yellow construction dumpsters. Despite the treacherous nature of giant machines lifting and pushing a 22-foot-long steel container filled with a ton of debris, 12 delicate eggs were found unscathed in a small nest beneath the dumpster. A little backstory: Checkers, the only hen of our three hatchlings from last July, seems to be following in the footsteps of Gloria, our Araucana "Houdini". Checkers has been consistently jumping the 4-foot-tall chicken wire fencing of the new chicken run. We found it futile to put her back in, so we let her explore the new grounds on her own despite the dangers of being a lone wandering hen. Since she is the youngest Araucana, we can distinguish her eggs because they are smaller than normal and blue-green. We found one of her eggs near the edge of the forementioned dumpster a while back, but didn't realize she had continued to lay them further under, where we couldn't see them. This morning, Checkers let herself out, as usual, and was wandering around the exact spot where the dumpster (and her dozen eggs) were located just 24 hours earlier. Poor girl didn't know what to do so she ended up just laying today's egg in the grass. While the eggs may still be good, they may have been damaged due to recent freezing temperatures so we're giving them to the dogs---not our customers. :-)