In 2011 my sister and I were in the chicken business. Things were going great! Egg production was at an all time high. As all good things do, it came to a end in an event I call the Great Chicken Massacre of 2011. The night after the horrific tragedy I sat down at my mother's laptop and typed out my first real piece of written work. I wrote it solely for the purpose of remembering the events that unfolded but after I let my mom read it. She immediately printed a few copies out and handed them out to the extended family. My dad even carried one around in his truck to share. It still makes me smile to think about how many compliments I got on it. Being that this is the fifth year anniversary of the Massacre, I felt it only fitting that I dig up the original text (with a few minor spelling and grammar changes) to share once again.

It was the first day of October, October 1, 2011. I was awakened by my mother, Cindy Lanier Riley at the brutal time of around eight o’ clock. You may be thinking that’s not that early, but let me assure you that for a high school teenager whose main reason for suffering through the week is for the few hours of extended sleep on a Saturday morning, it’s early. We were expected at our church, Silome Baptist, that morning to help out with a yard sale. Its always fun and I always enjoy it but getting up early will forever be painfully hard for me. After eating a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs we went and did our Christian duties. Everyone was in a good mood until my younger sister Chloe Yates Riley, 11 at the time, went to release our family pet Flair the Dachshund. She brought back the news there was a dead hen beside the dog pen. We were currently raising around 45 chickens, give or take a few roosters, for their eggs. As I scoped out the crime seen I began to question the cause of death. Everything hit me at once: the loud barking, the frantic clucks of distressed poultry, and the reason the body of a young hen lay at my feet. I turned and flew to the chicken house, leaving the limp chain of my pit-bull Chip lying in the dirt.

As always, Chip was overjoyed to see me running in his direction. Little did he know he had just crossed a line he could never come back from. I grabbed his collar and smacked him right in the face. I had never been this mad at him in his entire life. I could already see a few poultry bodies littering the ground. I half dragged half shoved his bulky body back to his chain and latched it. I couldn’t see how he had gotten off, the chain wasn’t broken and neither was the ring on his collar. That’s irrelevant though the fact was he was in trouble and I seriously doubted he knew what he had done. Back at the disaster area I tried to take role of who was left. I spotted a dead rooster by the name of Big T lying on his back in his pen. His wife, Little T, was no where in sight. The following six pens were left untouched. Why, I will never know. The seventh pen was missing two hens, Basket and Wheat, but the rooster, Severus, was still standing. His wives were not dead that we knew of, just missing. The next pen was a little worse off. Of the previous eleven hens and roosters that had occupied it there were two roosters. Two out of eleven. There was a hen and a rooster lying dead at my feet. The rest, who knew.

There was a hole in the next pen but most of them were accounted for with the exception of three guineas. I wasn’t really worried about their whereabouts because they were kind of annoying anyways. The final pen was the hardest hit. Of the nine Bardrocks, Americanas, and Rhode Island Reds there were six dead. Chip had ripped a hole in the fencing we had repaired the day before. I moved some chickens around until everyone was temporarily ok while I ate lunch. I know, not a good time to eat but I needed to get away from the site for a few minutes. After lunch Dad took Chip away, I knew it was Chip or the chickens. I love Chip but I shared the chickens with my sister, so I knew that was the only real choice. Flair sniffed out a rooster from the pen of eleven. He was a little shocked but living. Mom found the only Bardrock spared so I put her in a pen with a very nice Buff couple who graciously adopted her into their family.

Two guineas where found perched high in a cedar tree and within a matter of minutes they had been called in the missing third. Of course they were okay. I have to admit I have a lot more respect for them because of their determination to stick together. A yellow hen named Rubber Ducky that I honestly had forgotten was found and returned home with her family. I repaired the holes and joined in on the hunt for the missing. On further inspection of the rooster I thought to be Big T... I found out was a small rooster from the pen of eleven. Meaning, Big T and his wife still had a chance. The search party consisting of my mother Cindy, younger sister Chloe, youngest sister Casey, cousin Carla, and myself rounded in an Americana, two hens from the great pen eleven, and a small black rooster that I failed to realize was missing. Sorry little guy. By this point the only ones missing were Big T, his wife Little T, Basket, Wheat, Wifflio, an American rooster who had yet to be named, and someone else. I apologize but I really cannot remember who. After a little more search we located a dead Little T and a dead Wifflio.

Thats a lot of dead birds. I really hate that it happened. Later that evening Basket turned up alive. I still hope to find Big T, Wheat, and that Americana. Chip is living at my Dad's hog farm right now. He might even get a new home. That’s okay, as long as he is taken care of. I'll probably never forget this day but just in case I decided to record this historic event in history. The day the offspring of survivors will tell their hatchlings about for generations to come. The dead will not be forgotten, the missing will be found, and the ones who made it out alive will never sleep again.