Cinnamon drinks from purer waters now.

Photo copyright Aji, 2018; all rights reserved.

I know I have better photos of her somewhere, shots where you can actually see her little face, but this is the one I could find now. That's from May 26th, and that's Cinnamon perched atop the bird bath, the fluffy little red girl with her back to the camera. She and the other two red ones on the ground (Pumpkin in the foreground, Spice behind her) were the last of the reds from our second crop of chickens (plus one black, Dahlia, who's not in the photo). The other two are from this year's crop of new girls.

Cinnamon, like so many of her sisters from that bunch, became egg-bound at some point last year. It's a breeding issue; we always make sure our girls have plenty of clean water, healthy food, and the supplemental nutrients they need, but those that came from one source have been plagued by this repeatedly. We've mostly managed to save them, for a while; they get to retire from laying, but it also means, generally speaking, that we lose them a bit younger than would otherwise have been the case. Cinnamon was not quite four and a half, and by rights, probably should have had another year or two, but even with her injury, she outlasted several of her siblings/cousins.

She was also one of my favorites: sweet, gentle, friendly. She loved us, loved having us talk to her, pet her, give her the chicken treats and suet blocks she loved so much. She had still been hopping up onto the edge of the birdbath, which is one of their favorite places to drink, then hopping back onto the ground. Yesterday afternoon, she was seated comfortably just off the flagstones outside the front corner of the house where she could watch her beloved world, and where I spoke to her as I went in and out. There was no indication then that anything was wrong. But Cinnamon drinks from purer waters now.

Yesterday evening, just after 7:30, I took the trash out, which requires walking past their coop. And I saw her lying on her side in the middle of it, all her sisters up on top of the internal coop, chattering and cooing in confusion and, with chickens, what passes for grief. From outside, I couldn't tell which of the three reds it was by sight, but inside, I knew. I went in to check, and sure enough, it was her, my sweet girl. She would have been the one I would have expected to go next, but I thought, based on her lively behavior, that she had more time. Fortunately, I don't think she suffered at all; I think her little heart just stopped, and everything else with it, and she simply went over onto her side. She had already been gone probably the better part of an hour, so we're guessing the time to be around 6:45 or 7PM last night.

It was too late then (and the ground too dry) to bury her, so we wrapped her carefully and put her in a safe place. We soaked the ground briefly this morning, then buried her with everything she will need for her journey (including a couple of crumbled pieces from her beloved suet block). Shade and She-Wolf will be waiting with her various sisters and cousins to welcome her. Ice, too; his anniversary is tomorrow. Countless chickens and wild birds, Cree and all the other dogs, also. And while it was perhaps not entirely unexpected, given her condition, it was earlier than I had hoped, and it's left a hole in my heart for this sweet little girl who was perhaps the gentlest of them all, and one of our favorites. 

Last night, the sky turned the same cinnamon color as her feathers, as if to welcome her home. We love you, little Cinnamon girl.



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