A Day to Remember

Blood, squawking, the sound of an axe, and then the sudden shock of horror. These are the impressions that I remember from killing a suffering chicken.

It all began in the dark of night, September, 22, 2014. The night was calm and dry and the predators were out searching for prey. It was an average peaceful night in the chicken coop. It was then that one particularly homicidal beast, a fierce mountain lion, spotted its prey. The prey may have been protected in a sturdy chicken coop, but times were tough, in the drought food was scarce, and 6 chickens asleep was an undeniable feast.

After searching for a way into the chicken coop the mountain lion saw its entrance. The door’s support had been broken, thus making the door vulnerable to attack. After a brief struggle, he was in. And then, his reign of terror had begun. He bounced back and forth feasting upon innocent chickens and even chicks, causing high-pitched squawks and screeches. Luckily these noises would be the chicken’s salvation. It was these noises that awoke my mom, who then grabbed her pellet gun and scared the beast away. By this time one of the chickens was dead, and two were injured.

One of the injured chickens was blessed enough to not have a fatal injury. The other chicken however, was in the worst condition imaginable; half of her stomach was completely gone, her vital organs were falling out, her wings and legs were broken, and you could see her heart and intestines bleeding out on the floor. The tortured bird was powerless to do anything but scream through the endless agonizing pain. Her pain needed to come to an end; it was too much. We had to put an end to the bird’s misery, and so my dad and I set out to kill the bird in what we thought was the easiest way possible; by chopping its head off. As if this wasn’t a hard enough decision to make already, my little brother felt that this was a good time to have an emotional breakdown.

And so, with our minds clouded with the sound of my brother screaming, “Don’t kill it!” my dad grabbed an axe, and I held the chicken’s head. As hard as it is to cut a living thing’s head off, two things made it even more difficult: First, this was my favorite chicken because it actually laid green eggs and was unique, compared to other chickens; secondly, as it turns out, cutting a chicken’s head of is the hardest way to watch a chicken die. When the head was finally removed and I saw the brain fall out, I was hoping for silence and for the suffering chicken to be still at last. Instead, when the head was gone, the headless chicken jumped up and started running around wildly, leaving its head behind. Then, after about three minutes, it dropped dead. After this my brother Jakob, appalled by the gory mess that lay before us yelled “guts are everywhere”.  Not only was this moment sad but it was also terrifying. When the chicken was finally dead, I turned, only to find the chicken hopping all over the place.

In conclusion, the moral of this story is that owning pets is a living nightmare of pure agony. You may think that owning pets is fun and games; you may think that owning pets is a rewarding experience; you may even think that owning pets is a “big responsibility” yet still is enjoyable. Well, I’m here to tell you that all of these ideas are false; owning pets is the most horrifically, atrocious you will ever attempt. Once you have pets, you clean up poop, chase after your pets, and feed and water them twenty-four seven straight until they die, and when they finally do die, chances are good that it’s your fault. And so, if you’re thinking about getting a pet, stop.

I am also telling you this: to let you know that mountain lions are pure evil and chances are highly likely that they live near you and are ready to eat you if you sleep outside. Also, you may want to know that, to this day, the surviving chicken lives on. She wears bandages and moves slowly, but she lives!