A reader asked the other day, “How are your chickens?” Having read a few previous “Poultry Adventure” columns, she was interested in an update on Chanticleer and his small flock of hen-wives.

With deep sadness, I must announce the small backyard flock is no more — completely gone with only a pile of feathers left in the wake of a predator’s midnight raid.

A battle with RSV that developed into bronchitis left me down for the count near the end of May, unable to breathe outside in the Alabama heat. After a few days of observing the flock from inside, in the air conditioning, I made my way out to the henhouse on Thursday, May 22, with a scoop of scratch feed and treats and discovered the entire flock had been taken. Their henhouse was damaged, a nesting box torn off and the wire pulled back. Only poor Sassy, lame in one leg, was left behind, dead on the floor.

Poultry farmers, all livestock growers, develop thick skin early on. Friends have advised that death is certain, sometimes among the flock’s own members and occasionally at the paws or claws of a predator. One dear friend cautioned, “Never name your food,” and while the admonition carried wisdom, it was difficult to apply for someone with a life-long predisposition to making pets out of all God’s creatures.

A woodland search yielded no results for hens or a rooster hiding in the shelters of nearby trees. They were all five gone — Chanticleer the white leghorn rooster, his favorite henwife, Perty, and sister-hen-wives Sassy, Cinnamon and Amber — dead at the hands of an unknown enemy who left not a trace or a clue to its species.

Helpless is the word that feels most suited to the situation. I imagine the rooster defending his ladies, as he always did, and the terror with which they died, ravaged by some dog, coyote, wildcat or other enemy in the dark as I slept soundly in my bed.

Their chattering and humorous ways are missed in my view of the backyard as I write. The eggs are absent from my table, leaving a vast hole where the treat I had come to relish had been.

On a small scale, I now have a better understanding of what farmers experience when heat, drought, pestilence or disease decimates their herd, flock, crop and their livelihood. I am working to rebuild a better, safer coop for a new flock now, with a much greater appreciation for all farmers’ battle to put food on our tables.