The Ghost in the Darkness

[Contra-Nietzsche]

Chickens are immortal.

They defy all bullets shot at them.

One of the properties I guard has a chicken infestation, and some crazy lady who just moved out who kept chickens inside of her damn shop.... it's light industrial crap, machine shop, cabinet making, granite work, etc, all out in the country side.

New guys moving in this Saturday, and apparently over 10 adult chickens have been attacking the inside of every shop.... door by door mafia swat style, knocking stuff over and pooping everywhere, looking for food.

So.... being a bee-bee gun range enthusiasts at fairs and cabaleas, I came to a solution after unsuccessfully discussing with the chickens the need to leave, then throwing small chains at them and chasing them with sticks half the night.... I will kill them all.

Well.... I borrowed some pellet guns, 1.77 caliber. I practiced shooting at 30-40 feet shooting bottlecaps. I never got a exact bullseye, but it was within centimeters even when leaning back on a chair popping the targets.

I get to the granite shop.... it looks like a bee-bee gun course.... chickens walking on walls, tables and bushes everywhere, crazy chickens popping up left and right. I had the gate to this section of the compound closed, and everything hidden save for backup ammo and a big ass finishing stick so they wouldn't suffer.

I see one walk by as I load up the sniper rifle looking pop gun, crank it, look out it's sniper scope (was picking out leaves three miles away on a tree with it earlier). I decided against a head shot.... shoot center mass as I was told to by the guy I was borrowing it from, was certain to rip apart it's central organs and kill it instantly. I'm about ten feet from it, look through my scope..... and hear the big rooster land....., so I move my rifle to it..... it's taking up the ENTIRE SCOPE, and I can see it feet away..... and BOOM......

and the chicken yells, and runs off.

And I was like.... what the fuck......

and so I reload, and pop that sucker again. I didn't want it to suffer, just had to die. It said fuck you, it wasn't gonna die.

So..... I was dazed at this point, wondering how the hell I could of missed it. I took the rifle, loaded it up, and went out again..... and crocked the rifle between some marble slabs, pointing down the sawhorse, at the cross walk, and the rooster walked by. I took a exact aim of the neck..... center of the fucking neck where it meets the shoulders to sever the brain cord......

Pissed the rooster off. There is absolutely no way I missed. I hit the neck. Went through the chicken, chicken had a neck wound. Chicken didn't die. I followed the chicken to rifle butt it, and it was getting dark, and it decided to play out by the main gate near neighbors.... and had to hide my pop gun and act all innocent and all.... while the chicken tried to hop over the fence several times. I remembered I had a even larger beat down stick in my room/guard shack, stepped in there, and walked right back to the chicken, and went to step within range..... and the chicken catapulted itself sideways with it's one still functioning wing over the fence.

Now.... I was told I owed the green feathers on this chicken to the guy I borrowed the gun from..... and the chicken ran off on the main road.... alive.... a Filipino (crazy one, ex military infantry guy who was very very crazy) gave me a old joke of a pop gun in exchange for the bodied so he could eat them- or use them in some crazy ritual.... whatever.... I don't care, but I was damned if I embarrassed myself in not getting a chicken. It was nearly night..... I grabbed the gun, went out back to the sub-compound where the chicken infestation was, and picked one in the distance.... and took aim, and shot.... that one of all of them freaked out and started stumbling. I went to grab the stick on the marble slab, but it was running/fluttering fast towards a hill filled with weeds, so I cranked the gun, slapped another round in, whipped it up, and fired from far away.... and it screamed and lurched..... and didn't die..... and got into the thickets.

So at this point I'm pissed and bewildered..... and put another round, and shoot at one walking towards the trees bordering the main road...... and see the fucking round splatter him.... passing through him, hitting the cement, and rickocheting off, seeing where it lands. It had blood in it..... and the chicken never missed a beat, didn't even cry out.... just went into the woodline, where they are roosting right now.

I told the Filipino this..... and he laughed, saying chickens don't die from center massed shots.... only head shots. I pointed out it was twilight when I began my genocide, and never missed once..... but was promised the bullets would do their work.

And so in the morning, I gotta set up sniper positions and wack the fuckers once they wake me with the crowing. They have it coming..... I've been harassed and fucked with by the chickens in one spot or another since coming to this island.

There's one chicken.... my rooster, hiding up in a tree (we got a flashlight on the street and looked up at it) where it hopped up several branches, just napping on cue as if nothing happened.

I just wanted them to die in one go. I didn't know chickens were like werewolves or vampires where you had to kill them in a special way. That shit would kill a normal bird, squirrel, or cat fast. Chickens.... no, they say fuck you. Cause their chickens, and are too stupid to just die.

So, in the morning, it's gonna be me, in the prone.... taking long and deliberate aim, once they pop down from the trees (can't shoot up into the trees, the bullets might miss or go through them, hitting a neighbor's house), and just kill them one by one. I wanna hear them crow.... see them stick that damn chicken head up in the air, all proud and like, and just nail it there in it's deeply annoying cock crowing.

They must either die, or take a hint and leave. They know to fear me on sight..... they run from me, and hate the chain (chain never killed them, wasn't for beating the, but to throw)

Dude..... it's like their indestructible. I'm all pissed and bewildered. Damn chickens won't die. Never missed once. They just won't die.

[tentative]

Funny! A hint: Normally, you want the .177 cal for penetration. In this case, you could use the .22 version to deliver blunt force trauma. A lot of it depends on the gun itself. Too many air rifles have a low FPS performance. They might be accurate (or not) but they don't deliver enough ft. lbs. of energy to kill outright. The weapon has to be serious air -ie- european. a Beeman or RWS is deadly on small game at 50 to 100 ft. I have a RWS side-cock .177 w/ a Leupold 2 1/2 by 7 scope and at 50 ft I can put one pellet on top of another until I get tired of it. At 100 ft., the group will still cover the bottom of a pop can. The biggest problem of serious air is that the weapons cost as much or more than any good centerfire rifle. I've deliberately forgotten what I paid for my lash up. It's a bit expensive for a toy to just cut paper...

Just curious, but why not a simple box trap? Then you don't need a rifle, all you need is a sharp hatchet and presto! Dinner...

[Contra-Nietzsche]

I have set traps, and all I catch are cats. The same cat. He comes and begs for milk every night, cuddles in my lap, then goes off and gets himself caught in my chicken traps.

Today, I disguised myself as a cloth shower curtain from the 1970s- lots of ugly colors, and went on the prowl. They all like.... knew, remembered that I had to be avoided at all costs on sight, and so scattered the second I was back there. They hid really well, exploiting the property lines whenever they exposed themselves, such as walking on the damn wall triumphantly. They would only make noises when on the street side of the 7 feet wide thicket (was 12 feet till a few days ago to reduce their nesting area) that has a old fence on the inside of it..... but I follow them in paralell to the noise, hoping to get ahead of them and wop them at a low angle, so they will die along the ditch and I can go around front and bag them..... but they like, instinctively know this and rush the gaps, or won't past it.

I was moving along the industrial sector, and was in this wee little alley, and a chicken leaped from one roof directly above me to the next. Another escaped into a boat, under it into the weeds into the neighbor's lot. I can heat them on each neighbor's lot gobbling now frantically..... all melodramatic. Their a bunch of Pre-Madonnas, you would think I'm hunting the Queer Eye for the Straight Guys cast from how much their crying about this whole event.I can just see them spinning around and screaming their bobbing little heads, flapping their wings back and forth in other people's yards.

They managed to shit all over the place. I nailed one from a impossible distance, I thought it was gonna miss or bounce off it harmlessly. DIdn't kill it, just left a big ass welt on it's cracked skull. So I rifle butted it hard, and the rifle- being a air rifle, opening up in half..... and I was all pissed cause I just wanted to put it out of it's misery..... so had to crank it back so it would lock and wack at it a few more times in the skull.

So the filipino is all happy now, just went about ten minutes ago to drop off the dead chicken to his wife. Some women prefer flowers, but to each her own.

Fear the shower curtain.

[tentative]

Well, you're not exactly looking like Rambo in the chicken world... Hmmm... OK. two possibilities. get a small bag of cracked corn or chicken feed and set a pan of it in a blind alley spot and sit and wait it out. That's one chicken per day... You'll have to move the bait around so they don't get wise to the game and you might get two a day... finally, night stalks. They're blind at night, so a good flashlight attached to the rifle would allow you to attack their roosting areas. This sounds like a long battle, but you can do it. You can't let yourself be defeated by a bunch of chickens!