I think I'm Down A Chicken (with Update)

I came home from an appointment this morning to see this in the yard.

I drove the truck up to the pond to see if I could see anything from there, but no.

Two head counts of the hens, only came up to seven.

Not looking good.

The fox? A hawk? Stray dog? Hmm!

UPDATE:

Four hours later, after calling the hens and feeding them bread twice(a treat usually reserved for the fish), we were back to eight hens. I finally saw Number Eight hiding under a bush. I think she was roosting in the large juniper on the island, recovering from perhaps being attacked. I can't say I see any signs of injury, but those feathers hide a lot.

I guess the other hens talked her back down! It was too nice a day to hide, and not come out and play, now that I was around to protect them!

All's well here on the farm!
G'Night!

A Day In the Sun, Until...

The month of deep snow has thrown the fence training schedule right out the door. By now, the kids should have found out the hard way about electric fences. The bottom three strands of wire are closer together to prevent kids from getting out, and predators, like dogs, from getting in. For the most part, the two bottom strands are still under the snow.We do have an area surrounded by mesh fence that is saved for quarantining and bucks. Today that changed. We each tucked a doeling under our arm and led a bellowing Vinegar outside to enjoy a sunny day.
Twee and Brees were already outside, having gotten there on their own steam. Things were a bit slow but the twins started moving around, and soon enough they had their "snow feet".
It looked to be a fun first day in the fences for all the kids.
We took the gift of the warm sun on our back to charge us up for a walk up the alley. Partly for exercise. Partly to inspect fences. When we returned to the barn, I suddenly saw a large bird floating above us. If you can zoom in and identify this bird, I'd be very interested.At first I thought it was a turkey vulture because of the size. The coloring was wrong. It was black bodied and white winged from the ground. Then another hawk appeared. This is the second instance of me bringing out small kids on a nice day and having a hawk show up in short order. At this time of year, the pickings are slim with the snow cover. Our presence did not seem to deter the interest of the birds too quickly. Since we had a possum killed on the field earlier this week, I decided to bring the little ones in.Later in the afternoon, we had some hoofs to trim, so we brought them back out. They found the empty feed box to be a nice nest.