I found a pleasant surprise yesterday. We were gone for 3 days earlier in the month and on our return my remaining 2 hens were gone. We'd had problems with a red tailed hawk picking them off one by one and I figured the hawk had simply finished them off. Yesterday, I went out to the coop to clean it all out and let it air out over the winter, turn off the automatic hen door, and wait until spring to start fresh. When I opened the nest box, lo and behold one of my hens was staring back at me! I then went into the coop itself and the other hen was up on the roost. I have no idea where they have been hiding out, and definitely have not seen them out in the chicken yard at all for at least 2 weeks. They still had water and feed, so I wasn't too terribly neglectful! As planned, I cleaned out the entire coop, freshened up their provisions and turned on their lights (I keep a bulb under the water so it doesn't freeze and a string of lights on timer inside the coop just to brighten it up a bit on our gray days). How strange was that... The only thing I can figure is they must have been huddled up somewhere in hiding, made a break for the coop, and have been stayed holed up in there. The hawk remains ever vigilant in a big leaf maple close by.
