The Chicken Vanishes

One of the Red Stars disappeared two days ago. We went out to put them in for the night and suddenly there were 4 Red Stars instead of 5. This made us think, how long have there been four? Did I see the 5th one yesterday? And on and on. The thing is, there were no signs of foul play (wink, wink) or an attack. There are a lot of feathers around, but they are always losing feathers during dust baths and molting as they grow. Chicken-napping is a possibility, but why someone take just one and why not one of the bigger ones? About a month ago we clipped the Red Stars wings (actually just one wing as you can see above, so they just kinda fly around in circles). Hopefully the chicken was not eaten or attacked, but just got lost in the neighborhood defying logic by flying with one wing.

I did make a "Missing Chicken" sign to put up around our surrounding blocks, but then I realized we live next to a KFC . After scouring the surrounding areas, including getting a vantage point from the roof, we could not find the chicken or any clue of where it went.

Graphic and text courtesy of "A Guide to Raising Chickens" by Gail Damerow.

Wing clipping, the most common method of controlling the flight of backyard chickens, involves using sharp shears to cut off the first ten flight feathers of one wing.
Clipping causes a bird to lack the balance needed for flight but lasts only until new feathers grow during the next molt, which may be a few months in young birds or up to a year for older ones.
A potential problem is that clipped feathers may not readily fall out during the molt, requiring your assistance.

Wing clipping doesn't seem to hurt the bird at all, and isn't noticeable when they are walking around. The primary flying feathers are hidden underneath when the wings are folded. Also, the flying feathers are easy to pick out -- often a different color than the rest. Make sure to use a SHARP scissors.