Special Note - Some sad news

I Went down to feed and let the Three Degrees out this morning. Came up to the gate and noticed it was open. I went through and was surprised not to hear some gentle early morning clucking that I have been accustomed to. I noticed there were quite a few feathers blowing about. I looked into the coop and saw that the door at the back was open and there were no chickens there. I know I latched it after collecting the eggs the day before. I looked all around the garden and there was no sign of them.
I looked more closely at the feathers and there were a few with a bit of blood on.
But how could an animal get in?
The wind last night was pretty fierce and we knew from experience that if you pushed the door at the back, the bolt easily fell down and unlocked it. Because the floor is made of mesh, the coop always gets breeze coming in and with gusts of wind it must have moved the door enough to let the bolt drop.
I know I closed the gate last night after I'd locked them in. I closed it this morning and then gently pushed it a few times. Sure enough the movement was enough to dislodge the catch I have made for it. Back to the drawing board on that one.
La D and I looked all round the house and found a few blood stains, but no real sign of what happened to the poor chickens, and of course we hadn't heard a thing, probably because of the wind noise. We can only assume that it was a fox or foxes and we think they came in over the metal fence at the front.
Bertie was sniffing around for ages. So he could sense something different.
We were very subdued this morning as we cleared the coop and the pen. Bertie came in with ans was looking around for ages. I really believe he will miss them.
We will be going to get another set of Three Degrees on Monday.

Ciao