Pets experience the trauma from fire evacuation similar to us humans

Being evacuated from your home with no more than 20-30 minutes to leave can effect us in surprising ways.  For my husband it made him feel more in control instead of less.  He took the lead and is my hero for doing that because I felt suddenly lost and out of control over my own life.  I felt a huge responsibility to protect my grandchildren and my pets, and was overwhelmed by that responsibility.

When we saw the fire growing out of control we knew evacuation was imminent.  That is when I started grabbing the cats and placing them in the crate.  Harry and Molly were both inside the house so they went in the crate first, but I had to go looking for Marvin.  I ran around outside the house calling him but he didn't come, that is not typical for him.  The cats all know their name and they all come to me right away when I call them.  I went back inside the house and did another search of the house, specifically the guest room that they think is their own.  My granddaughter crawled under the bed and found him up in the box frame hiding.  All of this commotion and smell of smoke in the air must have scared him.  We got him out and placed him in the crate along with his two litter mates.  They were obviously shaken up.  Harry was spinning in circles and his eyes were huge as he tried to take it all in.

We drove for three hours to my daughters home.  The last half hour the cats were crying so loudly that my husband could barely hear me on the cell phone (we were in separate vehicles, they were with him and the dogs).  We happen to have our 5th wheel parked in an RV park in the city where our daughter lives because we have been working on a couple of house remodels there.  So the plan was to take the chickens to her house and set up the kennel in the back yard, then the cats and dogs would stay with us in the RV.  But with the cats so upset we decided to take the cats straight to the RV to get them out of the crate where they could calm down, then we would go to our daughters house and set up the chicken housing.

When we released the cats in the RV they were so scared.  They hadn't been in the RV since they were tiny babies so after being put in  a crate, driven around for hours, then dumped in an unfamiliar place, they were nearly in shock.  Their cat litter box was still in the trailer from when they were kittens, so I just filled it with litter and gave them a bowl of fresh water.  I did happen to find a small package of their cat food that was also left from when they were kittens, so I offered it to them.  They were not interested in eating just yet.  We gave them some loving petting, and talked to them calmly for a few moments, then we had to leave to get to our daughters to get the chickens set up for the night.

Once at my daughters house it was dark so we assembled the 6' x 6' chainlink dog kennel in the light of a porch light, while holding a flashlight.  This was much less room then they are use to having at home, but at least they were all safe.  After nearly not being able to catch Big Red we were so relived that we did finally get her because this would have been a very sad time if we had to leave any of them behind.  We put plywood on top of the kennel to keep the chickens in (they do not have clipped wings) and other critters out.   Then it was time to release them in their temporary shelter.  I placed each of the crates inside the dog kennel and locked myself inside.  Then I opened each of the crate doors.  Big Red came out first because she wanted out of that crate so bad.  She didn't have much room to walk around in the small kennel, especially with me and 5 crates inside.  A few of the other chickens came out of the crate but some of them refused to come out.  There were all very upset.  I reached in to one crate to pet Barbara, but she was so scared she pecked at me.  I continued to talk to them calmly, trying to coax them out.  Eventually they all came out but they were not happy.  They pecked at each other, flew around like they were insane, and pecked at me if they bumped in to me.

I felt so bad for them.  I worried that they might hurt each other or themselves being all cooped up in the small space without a coop to bed down in, especially after driving in the back of the truck in a crate for 3 hours.  I know I would have been freaked out myself.  I did have the forethought to grab my single water bottle waterer so I wired it up to the wall of the kennel.  I stayed with them a little while longer trying to calm them with my presence but it seemed that they were all so traumatized that my presence seemed to be making them even more upset so I closed them in the kennel and turned off the lights.  I was hopeful that with darkness they would just go to sleep and feel better in the morning.

The next morning I got up early and went to my daughters house to check on the chickens.  They were hungry and letting me know it too.  In our haste to leave our home I only grabbed a  gallon ziploc bag of dry chicken feed that was in my can from when they were babies.  I poured some of it into a cake pan my daughter had but the chickens were upset that it was not their usual food...I have been feeding them fermented feed with seeds and goodies mixed in. (that post is coming soon)  This dry dish of crumbles was NOT what they expected and they were voicing their distaste for it too.  Barry got in the dish and was kicking it out of the dish...searching for his delicious wet food!  Big Red was squawking loudly over this awful dry, plane food.   I grabbed my bottle of water and poured it into the dish and used a stick to stir up the food.  Then they calmed down a bit and ate their food.  This was at least closer to what they were use to.

The next task at hand was to make their temporary home more homey.  My hubby rustled up two more kennel panels so we were able to extend the kennel our another 5 feet (increasing another 30 sq ft).  We put tarps over the top of the new section and around the back side where the sun tends to shine the most, giving them the feeling of being enclosed.  The hubby cut the ends of a few 2x4's to make them two roosts.  As we did all these things to make the new run more homey you could almost feel the tension dissipating among the chickens.  They stopped being so aggressive with each other and with me as well.  Barbara, Goldie, and even Alice and Lucy let me pick them up and talk to them while petting them.  This helped me feel calmer as well as helping them calm down.  I think we are going to be okay.  At least until the day we pack them back up in the crates and head home.  Fortunately, last time we left the RV I left my van here, so for the ride home the chickens can ride in the van without all the wind they had to endure on the ride here in the back of the pickup.  It should be a much easier ride home.

The chickens temporary home.

Chowing down on their wet food.

Checking out the 2x4 roost hubby installed.

The first night in evacuation the cats were still stressed, jumping at every new noise or movement we made.  But now after two days everyone is settling in.  We are giving everyone lots of extra love and attention and I think it is helping us all get through this time of uncertainty.  Now that my babies are doing better, I have been calming down as well.  The first two days I could not eat.  The thought of putting food in my mouth made me feel like vomiting.  My heart ached for how this was effecting my pets, and the feeling of having no control over my own life, and the tremendous sadness I feel for the 19 firefighters who died in this fire.  But as I relax knowing that my pets are going to be okay and I deal with the emotions I am feeling for the lose of young lives, I have been able to finally eat some food and keep it down.

Harry, Marvin, and Molly eating on the bunk bed

Barbara resting calmly.

I wish we knew what was happening with the fire.  The news is either not getting reports from the fire crews or they are just not sharing that with us.  When we left the fire was encircling our community and the news says it is still very much out of control, so we have no idea what has been burned in our neighborhood.  I assume that if our house burns down someone will contact us.  We hope the evacuation will be lifted soon so we can go home and start to put our lives back together.  I continue to feel heart ache in my soul for the firefighters who have lost their lives, and to be so thankful for the ones that are continuing to fight this fire.  I am so sad for those in Yarnell who have lost their homes.  We are ready to join forces with others in our community to begin to rebuild their homes and our community.

Keeper of 1 husband, 2 grandkids, 3 dogs,
3 cats, and 17 Chickens!

 

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Yarnell Hills Fire continues to burn as our hearts mourn the loss of the 19 Firefighters killed in this fire.

I was hesitant to write this post because I don't want to draw any attention to myself, but the tragedy that I am involved in right now is so overwhelming to me that I need to write it.  Writing has always been like therapy for me, and today I need it more than ever.

My husband and I live in Peeples Valley, AZ where the Yarnell Hill Fire is burning out of control.  The fire started on Friday and it is believed that it started by lightening during our first monsoon storm of the season.  The area where it started is high in the mountains between the small towns of Yarnell and Peeples Valley.  The rough terrain is covered with chaparral pines, scrub oak, and manzenita's and it is all very dry...the perfect fire-storm just waiting to happen.

From what I understand (from a reliable source) the BLM thought the small fire in the mountains would burn itself out so they sent home some of the fire crew.  Saturday mid-morning we saw the smoke from the fire.  It appeared to be a few mountains over and looked pretty small at that time.  But within just a few hours the wind kicked up and so did the fire.  We watched the fire growing in size and intensity from our front porch in Peeples Valley.  Saturday night it was obvious that the fire was rapidly approaching our community.  We were afraid to go to sleep that night for fear that the Sheriff's office would be evacuating our town while we were asleep.  We don't have a home phone so we would not receive a reverse 911 call (which is the standard practice), so I left our bedroom window open a little so we would at least hear sirens if they were going door-to-door during the night.  We had a restless nights sleep that night, but no evacuation came.

On Sunday morning, after we checked the fire out our kitchen window and it appeared to still be smoking but didn't look too much worse than the night before, I went online and registered our cell phones with the Code-Red system so we would get an emergency call if our location was evacuated.  We thought at that time that maybe they had it under control.  But by about 10:00am the winds picked up and the fire followed suit.  We could see flames cresting the last mountain that separated us from the fire.  The flames where higher then houses that we saw in the distance and the smoke became very dark, building into huge plumes as the fire consumed stands of trees on the hillside.  Earlier on Sunday the fire command center was set up at the Model Creek School which was on the only road in or out of our community.  With the command center set up there we assumed the road out would stay clear for us to exit if need be.

View of the fire from our front yard.

By noon the fire appeared to be getting seriously out of control.  We saw several helicopters and small planes dumping water on the fire but didn't seem to be having any effect.  Then finally we saw the DC10 fly over and dump a massive amount of red fire retardant on the fire line.  We were hopeful this would hold the fire back, but instead it appeared that the fire spread sideways and was now surrounding our small community.   I took the following video at that time, panning left and right to show the span of the fire.



We knew this was not good and I finished packing for our emergency exit that we knew would soon come.  I had my three cats already in the large dog crate, our trucks were loaded, and the grandkids who were visiting had all of their bags already loaded in the truck as well.

Once most of our stuff was packed we were watching the fire to the south and east (two ends of a very wide fire line) of us burning out of control. Then all of a sudden we saw the fire to the south of us flair up and quickly burn towards the school where the fire command center was set up.  They were trying to fight that fire while mobilizing their vehicles and pulling them and the school buses out of the parking lot.  They moved out to the highway & Hays Ranch Road.  Then we got the Code-Red call to evacuate!

The next task was to try and catch my 9 chickens in the middle of the day!  Thank goodness my granddaughter was visiting...she is a 6 year old chicken whisperer.  Most of the chickens will walk right up to her to be picked up, like they don't want to, but know she will get them anyway, so they squawk and hold their heads down while walking right up beside her and stand there waiting to be picked up.  We opened 4 small dog crates just big enough to hold two chickens each, and one large crate for Big Red by herself.  My granddaughter caught two chickens, I caught two, then she helped me team catch four others.  I did my best to put two chickens closest to pecking order in the same crates...good thing I pay attention to these things while spending time with them.  Catching Big Red was another story.  While we were trying to catch her the Sheriff drove up our driveway and order us to get out!  I had to enlist my husbands help...he is afraid of the chickens and Big Red is equally afraid of us, so she was doing anything she could to get away from me.   We made the sad decision to get our other pets and grandchildren out of there, and leave Big Red since we could not catch her.

We ran and loaded the kids, dogs, cats in the crate inside the trucks, and the only room left was in the back so that is where we had to put the four crates of chickens.  I looked back to the chicken run and saw that Big Red was not in the run, she must have gotten scared and decided to hide inside the coop.  This was my chance.  I ran to the coop and pushed the automatic shut button on the ADOR Automatic Door to lock her inside.  Then I went in through the human door.  Then feathers began to fly as she and I went after each other inside the 6'x6' coop.  I caught her!  I then put her in the big wire crate and my husband helped me carry it to the truck.  I put her in the back seat next to my grandson.  She was thoroughly panicked -squawking and pacing around in the crate.  After about 20 minutes with the cool A/C on and my grandkids talking sweetly to her, she did calm down some.

Now that we had all of our pets and grandkids in the trucks we took off.  This was so scary because as we were driving out the only exit road from our community the fire was so close to us.  If it continued to burn much longer it might close off our only way of getting out.  About 15 minutes after we left Peeples Valley the wind shifted with the monsoon storm coming in from the north.  This southern wind was very strong, it almost blew me over when I was pulled over to check on the chickens in the back of the pick-up.  This change in direction of the winds is what pushed the fire back towards the town of Yarnell.  The winds were so strong that they moved the fire so fast that the fire crews were not able to do anything to stop it.

The fire quickly burned into Yarnell and trapped the 19 Hotshot crew members, and burning on into the town of Yarnell, burning a large number of homes.   I learned about the change in direction causing the death of the 19 young men from my daughter who was at home in Prescott Valley watching the news.  She called me on my cell.  I almost could not believe what I was hearing.  My heart felt so heavy, I began to cry for the loss of these young lives.  I have not been able to stop the tears every time think about them.  They gave their lives to save us and our homes.  It is so unfair...their lives were not a fair trade for our homes.  Homes can be rebuilt, but their families will forever be without them.

I am forever indebted to these heroic young men.  Please Pray for these young men and their families.  If you are not a Praying person, then please just take a few moments of silence to think positive thoughts for them.

The fire continues to burn around our home and community.  We are still evacuated and have no idea when we will be able to return home.  My heart is so heavy with what I think might be survivor guilt.  There were so many homes lost and 19 lives ended because of this fire.  My family and my pets are safe (yet scared and stressed) and as far as we know our house is still standing and I feel a kind of guilty about that.

I will probably share more of the fallout of this tragic event in future posts, but for right now, I just needed to share this with someone, anyone, so that hopefully someone understands how so very sad I feel at this moment in my life.

Keeper of 1 husband, 2 grandkids, 3 dogs,
3 cats, and 17 Chickens!

 

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ADOR Automatic Coop Door for Peace of Mind ~ Product Review

*UPDATE:  I currently own two ADOR pop doors, one for my main coop and one for my small temp coop.  Right about 1 year after installing the first door it suddenly stopped working properly.  It wouldn't open more than 2-3" on several mornings in a row, but it would close at night.  I figured it was probably the battery so I replaced it with a new one.  It worked fine for the first night, then would not open the second day.  I replaced the battery again, just in case I got a bad battery.  The door still (two months later) does not open fully on most days, but will close at night.  I have to manually open the big coop door each morning.  Also, the button to manually open the door has broken.  I don't feel the bump under the cover and it will not open or close the door manually using the button.  Because of this malfunction I have removed it from my "Stuff My Chicks Love" page and all links to their website in this post have been disabled.  I never support a product that does not perform well for me.

Note...The second door, that I purchased just a few months after the first one, is still functioning perfectly, and on the original battery.

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*Original Post Below*

I previously shared about taking our chicks on a vacation with us.  But I don't think we will be doing that again.  At that time the babies had just learned to put themselves to bed at night but we still didn't have a way of closing them up securely each night and letting them out early each morning unless we are home to do it ourselves.  Having a friend check in on our chickens once a day is good, but asking them to devote early mornings AND just after dark visits to open and close the coop is just too much to ask of a friend.

That's the reason we wanted to invest in an automatic coop door.  I used the word 'invest' because they are not cheap!  I have friends who say that spending $179 for a chicken door is just too much money.  But when you factor in the value of never having to worry about your chickens safety after dark if you are not able to make it home on time, or the benefit of actually sleeping in on occasion, or the ability to go away a few days and not needing to have a chicken sitter, then I think it is worth every single penny!

I looked at what appeared to be the top rated brand of automatic coop doors, the 'Pullet-Shut', but I didn't like the way the door opened, leaving the actual door 'waving in the wind', quite literally here.  We have 5 seasons each year: winter, spring, Wind, summer, and fall.  I guarantee that door would have been ripped off before Independence Day!  Then I learned about the ADOR, an industrial grade Automatic Coop Door.  It doesn't require electricity in the coop or an expensive solar panel to operate.  It runs on a long-life 6V battery that has been shown to last way more than a year with normal use.  I can handle changing the battery every year when we change the smoke detector batteries, even though I wouldn't have to worry about doing it at that time because it has a low-battery warning to let you know long before the battery dies that it needs to be replaced soon. 

The ADOR is a rugged galvanized steel door  that goes up and down instead of out, and it has a daylight sensor on the front so it automatically detects daylight and opens in the early morning and closes itself just after dusk.  If you tend to have late stragglers you can also reprogram it to either delay closing, or do a 'Last Call' where it will reopen briefly, shortly after closing, to let in any slowpokes who were late to the coop.  With the direct sprocket drive you don't have to worry about strings or cables getting messed up either.  Since this door had all the features that I hoped for, and the price was comparable to other quality automatic coop doors, I chose this one.

The only drawback was that the company had only been making this door for a short time.  Long enough to work out the bugs, but not so long that they had hundreds of orders to ship each day.  Until spring of 2013 that is.  I placed my order on April 20th, right about the time many other chicken keepers were also discovering them.  The large influx of orders was a bit of a surprise for Rod, the owner of the company, so they actually ran out of motors about the time I placed my order.  Rod immediately ordered more motors but they had to wait for them to be delivered, then install them in the units.  By that time they had so many more orders backed up that they used up all the new motors quickly and had to place two more orders for more motors right away so they could fill the new orders coming in.

As it turned out, my ADOR was shipped the day we left on vacation with our chicks and arrived about May 23rd.  I picked it up at the FedEx Kinko's on my way home with the chicks, with hopes of installing it the next day.  The night we got home I opened the box and read through the installation instructions.  It was almost bedtime for me so I couldn't do anything until the following morning, but I was anxious to give this thing a try.  I installed the battery and pushed the manual open/close button.  The door churned open.

I then reset it to automatic mode and took it to my bedroom.  I laid it on a shelf near my bedroom window, then turned off the lights and went to bed.  Within about 8 minutes the door closed because it sensed the room was suddenly dark.  At 5:34 am there was just enough light coming through my window that the sensor picked it up and the door opened. The excitement of this new chicken accessory motivated me to get out of bed and go install it on the coop right then.

First I had to remove the current pop door.  My opening was about 1/2" narrower and 2" taller than the suggested opening size for the ADOR but the door frame would cover any opening so I didn't bother cutting a new opening.  I just mounted it right over the existing hole.  Installation was Easy-Peasy too!  I used the manual override button to close the door so I had access to the three mounting holes just above the door.  I held the door roughly where I wanted it to be and screwed in the center screw.  This held the ADOR in place while I placed a level on the top of the frame.  My 6 year old granddaughter held the level up for me while I screwed in the other top screws to attach the door.  Then I pushed the button to set the door back in automatic mode and within seconds the door opened (because it was daylight).  This exposed the screw holes at the bottom of the frame.  I had to remove the little bar covering the holes, then screwed in the last three mounting screws and put the little bar back in place and I was done.  It doesn't get any easier than this!

ADOR Installed on the Coop over existing pop door hole.

My little Barred Rock (who we think is a Roo) was of course the first to come and inspect the new door.  After getting his blessings I gave the door a test. See the video of it in action.

Later that night I sat in the coop until the sun had completely gone down, waiting for the door to close.  The chicks had put themselves to bed at 7:42pm, while the moon was just beginning to rise in the sky. (the picture below looks lighter than it was outside, my camera adjusted the light automatically).  At 8:11pm the door was still open.  I was glad it did not close too early and lock a chick or two outside but I was a little concerned that it was still open when it was now dark.  I went inside for 2 minutes, returning outside at 8:13pm to find the door had closed while I was inside...darn, I wanted to watch it close!

Chicks heading to bed through the new ADOR Automatic Coop Door

 The next morning I was still asleep when I heard the chicks drinking out of the Chicken Fountain just outside my window...it was 6:05 am and they were already out and about in the run.  I went back to bed until 7:00am :-)  That night the chicks had put themselves to bed again some time before 8:00pm (when I checked on them), then at approximately 8:10pm the door closed.  

Disclaimer: I was not compensated in any way for this review.  I did not receive a free product for reviewing purposes.  I simply bought a fantastic product that will make my life much easier, and my chickens lives much safer, and I wanted to share it with you!  

Keeper of 1 husband, 2 grandkids, 3 dogs,
3 cats, and 17 Chickens!

 

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Question for the Chicken Pro's: How Real is Salmonella Risk in Handling Your Chickens?

Back when I was a child raising chickens we never gave a second thought to the risks of Human Salmonella infection, and never did I or any member of my family become ill because of it.  However, now that I am reading everything I can get my hands on about raising chickens again, I keep seeing articles telling me how risky handling chickens can be for humans.

I just read an article on TractorSupply.com about Poultry Handling Safety Guidelines and they make it sound like chickens are practically toxic.  The article says that children under the age of 5 should not touch chickens at all.  They also said to not let Chickens inside your home, especially in bathrooms.  Not that I planned on having chickens in my house hanging out like my cats do, but I would have baby chicks inside if it were to be too cold for them outside.

An article on the CDC website seems to be saying that the high risks are related to baby chicks (and ducklings). However is says that these baby chicks can contaminate the coop and the grounds where they roam.  They didn't specifically say adult chickens, however if the babies contaminate everything, wouldn't the adults be able to carry and pass on this infection? 

So one question I would love an answer to from you chicken pro's is how do you clean out the coop and use that material in your garden/compost if everything that comes in contact with the chickens has a potential risk of contaminating you with Salmonella?  

Also, both of these articles say to not snuggle or kiss your birds....well I have fond memories of having my favorite chickens sit in my lap quite often and I have read many of your blog posts sharing stories of your chickens being sociable and sitting in your lap.  So are we expected to wear a HazMat suit when handling our chickens so they don't get Salmonella germs on our clothes???

Is Human Salmonella Infection really so much more of a higher risk these days?   Are chickens more Salmonella-ridden then they were several decades ago or have our immune systems become more susceptible to it?  Or are people just more paranoid about things these days?

Please share what you know about this issue and how you have dealt with it.

Keeper of 1 husband, 2 grandkids, 3 dogs,
3 cats, and 17 Chickens!

 

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Did this post stir something inside of you? If so, Please leave me a comment, I would love to know what you're thinking!!!