Return of the Prodigal Chicken

 Nellie, our Plymouth Barred Rock, gave us a scare recently when she disappeared.  I was in the den, at the back of the house, when Rockefeller (the brown Araucana) looked in the back door and began peeping at me frantically.  I went outside to see what was the matter.  I couldn't find Nellie anywhere and Rockefeller was beside herself.  Those two are inseparable; they're never more than a few feet away from each other.  Nellie's the dark patch under the plant in the photo below.
We went around to the neighbor's houses and left "missing chicken" notes on the doors where people weren't home.  I was hopeful that she hadn't been eaten because there were no loose feathers or other signs of a struggle, but I wasn't terribly optimistic. She's only a couple months old.
As Sam's bedtime was nearing and the dark was falling I was feeling less and less optimistic and more and more sad that we had lost one of our chickens.  As a last ditch effort I decided to put Rockefeller back outside, but in her covered box, in the hopes that her incessant, woeful peeping (she hadn't stopped since 2:00 when Nellie went missing) might help Nellie find her way back if she was still alive.
Several times I thought I heard Nellie peeping, but each time I went to check it was only Rockefeller.  Then I thought I heard a call and answer pattern of peeping.  I thought, surely I'll just be disappointed again, but I went to check anyway.  And I distinctly heard Rockefeller calling and an answering peep from behind the recycling bin!  I went and scooped Nellie up and reunited her with an overjoyed Rockefeller.  They slept nestled snug in each other's feathers all night long.
Look for us on Wasatch Garden's Tour de Coops at the end of June!