Dear Ferret Folks- It's not just a cliche. This evening, I could not find Ping is He. Well, that is not unusual. Puma comes easily to a squeakie, but Ping is prone to that death-sleep thing, and sometimes spends the night loose in the house. I don't really mind. I squeaked and squeaked and squeaked until my husband snarled from the bedroom "I'm trying to sleep, here!" And I decided that this would be one of the nights that Ping spent out. He was out, all right. I don't know how, but he got outside. I didn't know until I was tucked into my warm bed with a book, and this HORRIBLE noise came from our chicken coop in the back yard! The one with our four teen-aged Barred-Rock chickens, three hens and a rooster. We got them when they were just little fuzzy fellows a few weeks ago. Now they are half grown and show their distinctive black and white tweedy pattern. Oh, the noise was wretched! Here is a Youtube video someone took of his Barred-Rock complaining. Imagine this noise times four, in the middle of the night! (HOW did Ping get out? When my husband went for wood? That's my guess.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ytxeQlHhhE&feature=related (Sorry, BIG. This new e-mail program doesn't want to tell me how to embed a link. I will work on the problem.) [You did fine. BIG] I stepped into my nearest pair of shoes and grabbed a flash-light. I ran out into the night in my night gown, heading for the coop. I could see Ping in the doorway very clearly, the coop has a little lamp to keep the teen-aged chickens warm in the night. He saw me coming and his whole body said "Oh, *hit, she caught me!" Oh, yeah. Busted, buddy. I scooped Ping up and by then my husband was right behind me. I handed the guilty party to my husband and he was returned to his cage, and to his companion, Puma. It was not easy to convince the teen-aged chickens to return to their coop. Nope. And I could hardly blame them. MAN! What a noise. "There's a weasel in our hen house! There's a weasel in our hen house!" My life is very full. Imagine all of this from the Barred-Rock's point of view. Alexandra in MA [Posted in FML 5972]