The Mice Are Back, Part 2

ChickenCat1

This morning, I witnessed this funny little inter-species drama. The cat had caught a mouse, and was lording over her dead prize. The chicken wanted it. Our chickens can be a bit confrontational, I say, they aren’t “chicken” about anything. Here you can see the chicken is posturing to the cat in a tense and threatening way, and the cat is reacting with annoyance. A few times the chicken pecked at the cat, and the cat swatted back. They were definitely having an argument.

ChickenCat2

Next the chicken dove in and swiped the mouse, and took it a distance away to keep it for herself. The cat, at this point, wasn’t too impassioned about the mouse anymore, since it was dead. She doesn’t usually eat them. And, you may recall, she has a very short attention span anyway.

ChickenCat3

But the chicken wasn’t satisfied  yet. She succeeded in driving the cat off, with some further assertive posturing. The cat relented, but wasn’t too intimidated. She finally laid down and put up her dukes, as if to say, “alright, you can have the mouse, but if you keep hassling me, I’m going to have to fight you laying down.”

The good news about seeing all these mice again (the cat has been catching a lot, and some also make their way into the house, where the dogs dispatch them) means that the coyotes now have their main food source back. After the flood in January, the rodent population took a big hit. But, as we know, they have amazing reproduction qualities when there is an open niche. We haven’t seen a coyote in quite a while now, and our poultry are back to enjoying full freedom during the daylight hours. There may be other factors too, Kirk had been shooting at the coyotes, as had several other neighbors. We didn’t think Kirk had hit one, but it’s sometimes hard to know for sure. It certainly did scare them however, and hopefully convinced them to stay out of our yard.

Kirk is disappointed to some extent, he was starting to get hooked on the hunt.

3 thoughts on “The Mice Are Back, Part 2

  1. workingcollies says:

    Hi Bruce, yeah, they sure were lurking more than usual for us this spring. But how quickly things can change- I wonder just how dynamic their populations, and also their ranges, are? It seems like some nights I feel like I hear 20 of them outside my bedroom window, and then we can go for weeks or months with no sign at all. They are sure mysterious.
    Michelle

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