A Chick, Chick Here

Right now it’s like Old McDonald’s Farm around here, on the verse:

“with a chick, chick here, and a chick, chick there,
here a chick, there a chick, everywhere a chick, chick!

Yep, if you look outside, it’s a pretty good bet you’re going to see at least one chick.  The first chick that hatched out is getting pretty big, half-grown at least.  Here he (or she) is stretching his wings.

This little guy wanders around on his own these days, until evening comes and he roosts with the chickens in the sheep shed (one of the three main roosting places for chickens here).

You can sort of get a feel for his size in comparison to the chickens in the background, which from left to right are a Buff Orpington hen (probably his mom), the Silver Laced Polish Rooster, and the Sicilian Buttercup hen.

Peepers was next to have a chick.  It looks just like she did when she was little.  This picture was taken May 12th, 2009.

And this picture was taken about 2 and 1/2 weeks later.

As you can see, these little chicks sure grow fast!

One of the white hens was the next to have chicks.  She started out with 5 chicks, but lost one somewhere along the way, so now only has 4.  (Are you impressed with my great math skills?)  Here she is showing one how to peck at cracked corn.

It doesn’t take those little chicks long to get the hang of pecking around for food.  They already come running when they see me go outside, figuring I’ll throw out some cracked corn.  And of course I do, because I woudn’t want to disappoint them after all.

Here she is with her chicks about 2 1/2 weeks ago:

And here they are more recently: 

 They have also grown quickly!

I discovered another hen had been sitting on a nest I didn’t know about.  She was hidden just inside the quonset hut where we store hay. She found a little opening she could scoot into and be well hidden, so we never saw her.

She ended up with 6 chicks, and she still has all 6 chicks.  Go Mama!

These weren’t the last of the chicks to hatch, however.  Not knowing we were going to have so many hatch “naturally”, I put a few chicken eggs in with the peafowl eggs in one of the incubators.  The first one hatched out May 24th.

You can see the chicken eggs are much smaller than the peafowl eggs, so I can squeeze them in-between.

It didn’t take long for the little one to get out.

They’re a little bedraggled looking when they first hatch!  But it doesn’t take long for them to dry up and fluff out, as you can see with the three here in the incubator I use as a brooder box for the first few days after they’ve hatched.

 A chick, chick here!