Hawk Attack

I've been free ranging my chickens and guineas more than I had been, after all it's summer, bugs and weeds are free which is a lot cheaper than the $20 per 50 pound bag of chicken feed. So I took the pups over to visit my friend for an hour so they and his dogs Tink and Mike could play. (forgot my camera, of course).

When I drove back down the driveway at the final curve there were a lot of gray guinea feathers and Killer, my white guinea and a couple of his guinea hens were screaming their heads off just outside the fence. As I pulled up to the garage a very large raptor took off to the east. I parked, walked back down the driveway and there was a silver guinea on her back, very dead but only just dead. I couldn't tell what actually killed her and neither could Hal who came down the driveway withing 15 minutes. I suppose it's possible she had a heart attack. Her neck was very limp but really, I couldn't say it was broken.

But I definitely interrupted the hawk before it could dig in, they seem to particularly love breast meat which is probably why my bird was belly up on the ground. Hal skinned and gutted the bird and as there was nothing wrong with it I stuck it in the fridge till I got home from Alpena this afternoon. It's now in the crock pot and smells great. As the guineas are a few years old I figure it had better stew for a quite a few hours.

Good thing I'm not sentimental about these birds.