Curse You Coyote....

So for the past couple of days we have had a coyote wandering around our farm yard threatening our animals. Darby has been very on top of letting us know when this mangy creature is out there but this thing, we'll call him Wiley, is very bold and doesn't seem to be very intimidated of Darby. Two nights ago Todd set a trap. Yesterday morning we woke up to find the food in the trap was gone but the trap was empty. Well...this morning at about 3:30 (with my bedroom window shut) Darby got up from her bed and ran upstairs, then she ran back down to my room, she did this about 4 more times until I heard her growling upstairs. I grabbed the flashlight and she and I headed out the back door downstairs. Darby was totally pointed and honestly looked scary...if I were a prowler I would have been terrified of her...she paced the yard while I shined the flashlight around the perimeter of the yard and then checked the goats and chickens and ducks. The goats were all huddled together in one corner (which totally isn't normal because they don't even get along) and the turkeys were in a corner together, also not normal because there are 3 Toms and they are very aggressive and dominant to each other. All I could see in the chicken yard were the 2 ducks, sleeping in their pool until I shined the light on them and they woke up and started to splash. I couldn't see any chickens because I assumed they were all in their coop. Then I stood there in my back yard with the flash light and thought to myself as the adrenalin was pumping through my body...what on earth am I doing outside???? And what in the world do I think I'm going to do if I actually see this coyote in my yard-whistle at it? So I went back inside and left Darby out for a bit. I did go out on the deck and shine the light all around to see if I saw anything but I didn't.

I tried to get back in bed but Darby remained on high alert and was wildly stressed out about the fact that I was getting back into bed when there was something out there. I let her out and left her out for about an hour. Then at about 6:30 she started doing the same thing so I let her out again and she began barking. I heard the dogs at the property behind us barking as well so I imagine Darby scared the coyote back and those dogs were now seeing it. Pesky little thing, made me loose sleep, stressed me out and caused a couple of unnecessary contractions. Todd's home now and is going to set the traps again today. This is just one of those things you never realize that people have to deal with if you don't raise animals....ps. I didn't take the picture.