Island life is not that different from country life. For those of you who are not aware, chickens run rampant on St. Croix; and most islands and third world countries. For the most part, they live in the bush, roost in trees and annoy the heck outta people, especially the roosters EARLY in the morning. My father-in-law even refers to their melodious call in our wedding poem.
A few weeks ago, I had enough and had to shoot a rooster who cock-a-doodled-dooed one too many times right in front of SC’s window while she was napping. Yes, shot. But not dead apparently. It was the FIRST time I had to do it. Normally, the Fisherman is responsible for these type of events, shooting roosters & rats. Rats are also common place on islands and third world countries. (fyi…a couple of weeks after this incident, I had to shoot a rat).
Anyway, I shot the damn thing and was a bit giddy. Strange, I know. Called The Fisherman on his charter to bragg. He told me to go shoot it again because I probably had just “stunned” it and it was gonna get up and run away. I couldn’t do it. And sure, enough, about 20 minutes later, that rooster got up and ran away. Hopefully he told his rooster friends NOT to come around our house anymore.
My mother-in-law was tickled to death about this story; that I am the perfect woman for his son. I agree. Fast forward to this past week, I received this email from her. Keep in mind, she lives on a 300+ acres ranch in the Texas Hill Country. She ordered her beautiful chickens on-line and has the CUTEST chicken coop you have ever seen. Complete with an old chest-of-drawers for the laying hens and even an old piano for fun!
Remember the rooster that jumped on John while I was down there?. He’s jumped him a couple more times, and he got after Kenneth recently. The first time he flew at me, I kicked him and chased him with a broom, whopping him every time I caught up to him. Wednesday night, I went over to put the chickens up for the night. When I got there, they were all outside the chicken yard, so I headed in to check for eggs. This same black rooster sort of eyed me when I walked by. He waited for a minute, then followed me in and jumped me from behind. Made me SO mad I kicked the daylights out of him. I thought for a while I had broken his wing. I went on in the old house and the more I thought about it, the madder it made me. I’m not going to have a mean rooster! He could put a child’s eye out in a heartbeat. I was in the Suburban and John’s 22 was on the front seat. I went out and got it and shot the sucker. Then I proceeded to skin him. No one was here, so I couldn’t get any trophy shots like the guys all do with their deer, but I did get ‘before and after’ pictures.
After I got through cleaning him, it was already dark.
I took the guts and wings and all the leftovers down to one of the deer feeders where we have a live trap out. John has been seeing some Boone & Crockett coons on the trailcam. When I got there, there was already a coon in the trap, but I had used the last bullet on the rooster. So I had to drive all the way back to our house to load up, back to the deer feeder to blast the coon. Took him out, put the chicken parts in, reset the trap, then hauled the dead coon off.
John got home from Austin about 9:30. Saw the lights on over at the old house. I was still over there changing beds and cleaning the house, getting ready for my e-cousins to show up on their way home from the east coast, heading back to California and Oregon. Anyway, when he drove up and saw something hanging in the deer cleaning shed, he thought Killer had been here and killed a pig. Couldn’t believe I shot the rooster.
By the way, we still have three more. They probably know better than to mess with me!
She has quite a bit more experience with these type of things than I do, but it is all in a days work! By the way, at least she got some eggs!
You are cracking me up! I was laughing so hard the entire time I read this I was crying! Only you!
This is hysterical. I think we have to take matters into our own hands at our house. We have four roosters that parade the hill 24 hours a day!
Thatta Girl! I’m sending Eileen over for lessons.
Great story! I stumbled across your blog while searching for just the right image. Believe it or not, the “after” picture of the rooster is what I need. Any chance you or your mother-in-law have a higher-resolution version you could share with me? Now you’re wondering “who is this creep?”, so I obviously have to explain. I’m helping a friend with a small project. My part is to provide a photoshoped image of him cleaning a tauntuan. Since tauntauns are fictional animals from Star Wars, I’m going to have to be creative. The rooster has the right shape, I’d just need higher resolution.