Ralph Is Gone

by Pa Rock

Farmer in Autumn

I approached the chicken coop before dawn this morning and knew something was wrong before I even got close enough to notice that the door to the coop was open.  There was no light yet, but the guineas were already fussing and the three little roosters were calling their greetings, or threats, to the approaching day.  But Ralph, the big rooster, was eerily silent.  Usually Ralph is the first voice of morning, and the most strident.

The door being open was a very bad sign.  It meant that I had forgotten my last chore of the evening yesterday - that of walking out to the coop and closing the birds in for the night.  The poor guys had been there all night, unprotected  from the owls, raccoons, coyotes, and all of the other predators who might have happened by.

I rushed in and turned on the lights to take an accounting of the situation.  The three guineas were up in the rafters, one little rooster was also in the rafters, and the other two were sitting down lower on the metal garbage can where Ralph normally roosts.  And Ralph, the farm boss, was gone.  There were no feathers strewn about the coop or other signs of carnage, but the big golden rooster was gone.  Something had apparently taken advantage of my fatal negligence and grabbed him during the night and then ran for the tall grass.

It was a very distressing way to start the day, and I am going to miss that fussy old rooster.

Why did I forget to close the door to the chicken coop yesterday evening?  I'm getting old, and I do forget things.  There have been a couple of other nights when I have forgotten the birds until it was almost my bedtime, and then walked out after dark to check on them and shut them in.  But it was probably due to fatigue more than just general forgetfulness.  Yesterday I completed two hard days on the mower, covering the whole yard and mulching acres of leaves.  I went to bed early and never gave the birds a second thought.

Ralph deserved better.  I'm sorry, buddy.