There are many things about chicken keeping that are good, this situation is not one of those good things. Chicken in a tree at bedtime. Coop shut up time, dark, everyone else is safely in. My count is wrong, someone is missing.
Going back say 6 years we had this issue with a chicken named Rebel. She had a habit of settling into a tree instead of going into the coop at night. KitKat could usually "encourage" Rebel down, it's one of his super powers. Failing that a kid would have to climb up the tree.
KitKat helps get Rebel out of a tree 2016
Since then we haven't had chicken in a tree problems. Rebel calmed down or gave up trying to sleep outside and nobody else tried to sleep in a tree. This years batch of chicks is a little wild, a little rebellious and some nights I find a few in a tree. Not too high up though and I can prod them out of the tree and into the coop. This night one of the chicks, a Sapphire Gem breed, now 4-5 months old was missing. I counted birds and counted again. I looked in the tree where I thought she might be, I looked all around the farmyard. Finally in a tree behind the coop I saw a little movement, by now it was quite dark so I was thankful to spot her.
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| Chicken in a tree |
She is so high up and isn't going anywhere by her own power now that it has gotten quite dark. Chickens can't see well in the dark. KitKat was already in for the night so I couldn't count on his help. Felix was around but in a rather aloof mood, as Felix often can be, she wasn't interested in helping with my dilemma.
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| Felix says..It's a no, I'm not into chicken wrangling. |
So what to do? It's not a climbing kind of tree, she's pretty high up there. The board I keep around to gently prod or even help this batch of chickens out of the tree with is by far not long enough. So...I got the fruit picking pole, it has a basket on the end and I thought maybe the chicken would grasp on to the basket and I could lower her. Too short. I thought of the roof rake and so went to fetch that. It's long enough by the wide top part doesn't go through the branches very well to get where I need. This is an old apple tree, I wasn't looking to forcefully prune it or break lots of branches. And of course I don't want to hurt the chicken.
Finally found something long enough, the roof rake.
Finally I wrangled the roof rake into a good position but that was only half the battle. Next I had to find a way to get the chicken to get on the rake and then somehow lower her down without injury to chicken, tree or myself. It took a little time but at last by some miracle it worked!
But will I be able to get her on the roof rake? 
It took awhile but finally, success. 
Chicken being safely lowered from the tree.
I even managed to take pictures while lowering her! Always a photo storyteller at heart.
At last the chicken is in the coop, I shined my headlamp for a while so she could see to settle in, did a recount in case someone had gone out of the coop and finally, close to an hour after starting evening shut up chores, everyone is safe and where they should be.
In the coop for the night.
Why didn't I just let her sleep in the tree? Predators, that's why. I didn't name this blog My Wild Homestead just because of the many animals that currently and in the past have shared our lives. It's also because we live in a very wooded area, there is plenty of wildlife and some of those come out at night. I didn't want our little Saffy chicken to be their evening meal. I may start calling Saffy (from blue sapphire) Blue Rebel instead since that is certainly what she is! Hopefully tonight will go better. I do go out at dusk not full dark so if anyone isn't yet in they can see and be encouraged to head to the coop. It wasn't that dark when I realized Blue Rebel was missing but it was full dark by the time I found her. Darkness comes quickly in the woods.
Tools of the trade an an unripe apple casualty.
Yeah!
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