Last night one of my sons left the door to the chookyard open and 3 chooks escaped. We managed to get two back in but one eluded us. This morning I went on my morning chilli inspection and to my horror two of my chilli plants had the centers nipped out and two more were missing a few leaves. That was it, out came the 12 gauge and on and off I spent the best part of the day stalking said chook through the bush around our house. It was crafty and a worthy adversary and I caught many fleeting glimpses of it dissappearing into the scrub but in the end it lingered and the 12 gauge finally won. The good news is that the chillies defiled were only semi commons, a red hab, a hot paper lantern and the ones that lost a few leaves were a guadalope and a cancun and they will survive.