Autumn’s gone

Last night Autumn put herself to bed early. I got her back out for the bedtime sunflower hearts. She had some sunflower hearts and then returned to the perch in the chicken shed. This was about an hour before the pop hole closed. When I perched the girls that don’t go in themselves, Autumn was still perched next to Sugar.

This morning first thing Autumn wasn’t out in the run. I looked in the chicken shed with trepidation. There was Autumn in the middle of the shed. Autumn had gone overnight.

We knew yesterday that something wasn’t right but never expected Autumn to go so quickly. Autumn was exactly two years old.

I think at the back of my mind I had always known that a girl that doesn’t lay eggs must have something adrift. The good thing is that she didn’t have a long spell of going down hill. It was very fast. She had her last sunflower hearts at bedtime last night. There was no agonising decision to make or trip to the vets.

Autumn had laid forty five eggs in four months and then hadn’t laid in the fifteen months since then. After finding the weird string of tiny eggs in the run it seems that she wasn’t destined to ever lay again and in the end it was her downfall.

I will do a tribute to her over the next few days when I have been through my photos. I am feeling a bit shell shocked at the moment as this really wasn’t expected. It is so sad.