{"id":364,"date":"2013-07-31T21:44:02","date_gmt":"2013-08-01T02:44:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.polarisstarfarm.com\/adventures\/?p=364"},"modified":"2013-07-31T21:48:15","modified_gmt":"2013-08-01T02:48:15","slug":"farewell-mighty-grasshopper-hunter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.polarisstarfarm.com\/adventures\/2013\/07\/31\/farewell-mighty-grasshopper-hunter\/","title":{"rendered":"Farewell Mighty Grasshopper Hunter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amidst our busy summer, our pet rooster Stuart went over the Rainbow Bridge<\/a>.\u00a0 Stuart was one of our original Mottled Javas that I spent all day driving to get from the breeder (yes, Texas is really that big).\u00a0<\/em> Stuart was named for the cute little mouse Stuart Little <\/a>of Hollywood fame.<\/p>\n

Stuart\u00a0was a runt from the start, but very cute and affectionate – even without us spending a lot of time with him.\u00a0 Stuart enjoyed people and wanted to be with us even more than he wanted to be with the other chickens.\u00a0 Whenever the\u00a0flock that Stuart lived with was allowed to free-range, Stuart would come running to find\u00a0us anytime he heard us outside.\u00a0 He could\u00a0run out of the coop to\u00a0meet us faster than we could get the people-door to the chicken run open.\u00a0 Stuart was always underfoot and I did manage to step on him more than once, but that didn’t keep him from rubbing up against my legs while I refilled food and water containers.\u00a0 Stuart LOVED chasing and eating grasshoppers more than any of the other chickens – earning him the\u00a0title\u00a0“Mighty Grasshopper Hunter” from his proud human father.<\/p>\n

Our best guess is that Stuart was taken by a hawk,\u00a0based on finding\u00a0a feather trail (no blood or anything else)<\/em> in a direction where a hawk could have swooped down from the oak tree by the pond, grabbed Stuart, and flown across the pasture (and because the dogs did not alert me that there was a coyote, which would have been the other predator we have here that could have carried a chicken away without leaving anything other than feathers).\u00a0<\/em> Even though we knew that predators were a possibility (which is why the breeding\u00a0stock is not allowed to free-range without supervision)<\/em>, we had not had any actual\u00a0predator attacks\u00a0until now.\u00a0 And unfortunately\u00a0our favorite chicken\u00a0was the one sacrificed in our first predator attack.\u00a0 Knowing\u00a0Stuart,\u00a0he was so busy chasing grasshoppers and clucking happily between the garden and the pond, he probably\u00a0never even knew there was danger nearby.<\/p>\n

So we say goodbye to Stuart.\u00a0 Who would have thought that a runty, late-blooming\u00a0chicken would have\u00a0such a big\u00a0personality and become one of the family?\u00a0 We sure miss you Stuart!<\/p>\n

STUART ROBINSON\u00a0\u00a0 March 26, 2012 – July 13, 2013<\/p>\n\n\t\t