Happy Harvest Blog
The latest chicks
I had a whole passel of Silkies go broody this summer. Some of them give up, two more go broody. The usual, in other words. I’m not letting them reproduce this year- I have so many Silkies. I did give them five of Cheeks’ eggs between them though. Drama central! If any of them stood up to adjust themselves, another one would rob an egg. Every morning most of them would go out for breakfast, and then there would be lamentations when they came back and their eggs had been swiped by another hen.
An extra puffy tail
The little (lone) Silkie chick has just had one extra puffy tail sprout out today, along with a tiny head crest and tiny feet feathers on those little black legs. Looks especially good with evening back-lighting. It's funny what a transformative difference a day makes - chicks grow so fast. Feathers just pop out here and there, and they go through some pretty funny stages. This poor little chick is now only one third the size of its nestmates, which are bigger than some of the other chicks get before their Moms move on.
Greenhouse freedom
I have to move all the coops in to the greenhouse, and I'm at a bit of loss what to do with all the chicks and mamas that have been at large in the GH for weeks now. They're very much enjoying themselves. Somebody's got a windfall tomato. Interest is aroused. Now I got the tomato!I got the tomato back! It seems most or all of the non-Silkie chicks don't really need their moms any more, so they might be willing to go back in Silkieland.
Apples is an unfit mother
It's very disappointing. I wanted her to pass on all her gentle characteristics. But it seems she's not interested in passing anything on. This morning she was up, and there was a tiny chick! White with some brown, I think a Silkie. Since she was up, I moved them all to a chickery, but she was noticeably inattentive to her chick, not warming it (and it was a cold morning). I repeatedly placed her on top of her chick and the remaining eggs in a box, and she'd just squawk.
New hen boxes
The hens with chicks got an apartment reno. It was time to retire those battered old boxes. So I set up a new condo system, each with a little bed of hay. But will they use them? All the other chickens came and inspected of course. Well, I left the most popular box, double occupancy in a pinch. Oh! A promising amount of attention.Look, Mom, we found a new place!They approved. 2/3 were occupied, and it was much nicer to transport these boxes with closed lids
An experiment in chick freedom
Ursa Minor was protesting the confines of the chickery, so I tried something. I let all the moms and chicks loose. This is not rain day, these are the tiny chicks in their first few days of life, that are typically in chickeries in the greenhouse (warm and dry), before they go out to chickeries on grass for a few days, before they run wild with their moms (a staged transition to free-range). So I propped up the chickeries so they could leave, but still, get back in their familiar box.
Chick party in the greenhouse
Rain day! It did not start well. The forecast, usually accurate to the hour, was predicting rain starting at 9pm tonight. At 6am, pat. pat pat. patpatpatpatpat! I leapt up. I needed to give the pigs access to their house. Yesterday I'd moved their house (thank god!), but I hadn't cut out the path to reroute the electric fence around it. Really crappy work that I planned to do today before the rain (plenty of time!), as I was so tired and sore yesterday.
new chicks
Clever's chicks made it! (sort of). I didn't expect them to because the eggs were poopy, and that can choke off the exchange of air and humidity to the developing chick. She rolled one egg away from her a week ago, and it was rotten. I should have known she knew her other two were alive. However, one died after hatching. This is quite rare, for a chick to die after hatching under a mom, and after being alive long enough to dry out and fluff up.
Foxy and Feisty
Feisty's a very pretty chicken. We had a good photo shoot before dusk: If you catch them at the right angle, which isn't hard to do, Silkie hens look like they have no eyes at all. Foxy is irritable. Her chicks are at that stage where they ignore her until they need her, don't pay attention, and want to stay up too late. I've still no idea how many days/weeks it takes for them to hit these chicken stages of development, like pants, reluctance to go to bed, independence, rooster hero worship,
Chick freedom day
Feisty and her chicks liberated themselves today. They usually let me know when they're ready for the big world by starting to leak out. Thing is, Foxy's chicks are days older, and they weren't the ones to start getting out. Once Feisty was out and about though, Foxy got excited. One has such beautiful wings. Who, me? I helped them out by lifting up the side of the chickery, and they started leaking out. One.Two.Three and four.No, I'm back in. All out.
A fleet of broody Silkies
Everyone is outside today! First day out for Foxy and her full-size chicks. She's overdue for it, but it's been rainy. Cotton and Daisy know all about out but have also been in for a bit due to weather. Ten to one one of these hens (Cotton) is going to fly out and go big world today. And tonight, one set of them has to go to the big house - move in with the other hens in Silkieland. That means the hens will all scrap to sort out their order again, but the chicks will like that a lot.
Three new chicks
Foxy has managed to hatch 3 of 4 chicks. She somehow broke all her first eggs, and I gave her a second batch, so she has been setting longer than usual. She's used her confinement productively to start regrowing her moulted feathers. One. Two. Three! They're full-size eggs and chicks, looks like two Ameracauna crosses and a Chanticleer. Seems like the danger zone. Foxy is notably the least good-looking of all the Silkie hens, always grubby and making no effort at all. Just a slovenly chicken.
The post-breakfast perching hour
Perching and arranging one's feathers hour. It's the only time besides bedtime that they all get together so closely. Pepper's thinking about a higher branch. The newest babies are on the grass today! This one little silvery grey one is adorable- a new colour; we'll see what he/she turns out to be.
Meet the broodies
I've got three little broody Silkie hens, installed in the covered wagons in the greenhouse. Amazingly, they are all from the new set of chickens. Which is great, that means that they have learned how to chicken enough to go broody. Impressive. All of them are sitting on full-sized eggs that I gave them. Four each - I'm hoping for 100% germination, and the hens are petite. In the past, I've always given a Silkie 5-6 big eggs, but they never all seem to hatch. These girls are all excellent sitters.
Auntie Apples- the end of the house chicken era
The little crippled chick was feeling much better today. She started the day with some demanding chirps, so I tucked her in with HW, which always makes chicks happy. After a cozy nap, she got restless and I put her back in her box. I desperately needed more sleep. We had a big driving day and it's not good waking up feeling nauseously sleep deprived. But she wasn't having the box. Cheep! Cheep! CHEEP! CHEEP! CHEEPCHEEPCHEEPCHEEPCHEEPCHEEP! Chicks are loud. Arrgh. I shuffled downstairs, wrapped her in my t-shirt, and tried to go back to sleep with her tucked in against me.
Circus chickens
What's happening here? I know it might be hard to tell. That would be the notoriously mom-surfing chick, the yellow one, sitting on her mom. Not only that, mom is perching on the swing. With other chickens. The swing is swingy. I rarely see them use it at all. Obviously, she is far too large for mom-sitting at the best of times, but like one of those huge dogs that still thinks it's a lap-sized puppy, she doesn't realize she's outgrown it. And while perching on a swing might not be the best of times.
Too cute for chick school
Perchick is very watchful. She mostly trusts me around her chicks, though. She has chicks poking out. Cream Puff does not trust me, and wow, a full size henpeck is more meaningful than a Silkie peck. No chicks poking out here. The one "old chick" looks much like a tiny, brown bald eagle. Like a yellow chick wearing a brown cape. And this brood, well, they're not grown up enough to be above a good wing pit warming.18 chicks: I'm going to need a lot of names.
Spring chicks
The chicks are all alive, even the little half-size yellow chick, but there have been no late hatchings. That's a pretty poor hatch rate - 12 live chicks out of 23 eggs under two hens. The 13th was unlucky. But that is a dozen bright new little lives, which is wonderful. Maybe not all the eggs were fertile, or the late frosts we got made it too cold for them.I'm coming in there. The other chicks are still in the chickery. Usually, they start to break out, which lets me know it's time for them to be at large,
Water off a chick's back
Butterfly party by the GH door. There's a bit of mud there, and it drew a butterfly crowd (why?) Mama hen and her chick duo slip in and out of Silkieland, but stick close by to it. They seem comfortable over there, rather than the far side of the greenhouse. All the chickens could come and go from Silkieland, it's not a secure facility, but most stay. They're a little too crowded for my taste but they show every sign of contentment, so - good enough for now. When I make the next one space will be doubled.
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