Patchesnposies

I woke up one morning last week and as I sat drinking my coffee, I heard an unmistakable peep out in the yard, I told my daughter, "That sounds like a baby chick!" We went outside and looked and there in the yard was a young hen with 15 freshly hatched chicks! She had stolen a nest and every single one of them hatched!

I scooped her and the babies up and put them into an old rabbit hutch we have, to keep them safe. We are building a Broody Yard to put them in, but I needed to keep them safe from the Roadrunner family that frequents our yard. Roadrunner's, hawks, coyotes and feral cats make off with baby chicks.

I'll take a picture and post it!

nhnative

I hope that you are not getting them through the post office. When I went to mail my package I heard a lot of birds and when I asked she said someone had ordered them through the mail and if they didn't pick them up soon they might all be alive. Yes I did vote and I have my Hellebores that are blooming and my daffodils are almost up

lawsonmugs

Wow Pat those are beautiful. I'm getting my chicks through our local feed store. I have bought chicks many years ago through the mail and you need to get them immediately. They can survive in the little box without food for only a couple days then they need feed and water and heated.The way our mail is delivered and routed now I won't buy that way anymore. Deb I would love to see your new little ones. I've had chickens for years and years. Cyotes got my late few and I didn't replace them. Then there was a bad virus going around and millions of chickens had to be destroyed.Of course you all probably noticed the hike in egg prices for the last year. My husband is building a new chicken house and pen for my new babies. It will be near our house and not so far off that animals can get them. I let mine free range when they get a few months old.Then close them up at night. I think my husband forgot to close them up one night. He says he did. No body got any new baskets lately?

Patchesnposies

Mary, for a lot of years I raised specialty birds and actually sold their eggs that I mailed all over the country for others to incubate. It was fun, but when the PO reorganized and closed so many hubs the eggs couldn't get to where they needed to go as fast as they needed to....or were too manhandled to survive (even if the shells were intact the innards were scrambled), so I stopped.

Now we just have a laying flock for our own use and they are in a huge pen. Every year we have a few hens that want to go broody. This little hen was one of last years babies and she grew up to do the same thing her mama did. The broody hens are the ones that figure out a way to escape and hide their nests. Most of the time they hide in the duck pen. lol I have a silky show girl hen that is trying to incubate four duck eggs as well as her own. (duck eggs take longer so I'll rescue them when hers hatch)

These are what she gave us this year:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]544928[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]544930[/ATTACH]

My basket is on the way to England for Caroline as of this morning.

Pat, your flowers are so pretty!

Deb

lynnie

Ladies, THANK YOU for the pictures.
o.k. so brody means to hide the eggs in a different nest?
What kind of chickens are in the picture,one is all yellow and the others are mixed. They are too stinkin' adorable!!
Love the babies. After they hatch, do the mothers tend to them for a few days? I mean they are careful when they are still eggs, they hatch and then does she kick them out of the nest? Pretty little chickens.

Patchesnposies

Lynnie, Broody hens can be ferocious when defending their babies. They can even be fierce when protecting their nest! Broody simply means a hen wants to sit on eggs and raise some babies. She will lay for a week or so and sometimes her sister hens will add an egg or two of theirs to the nest, and once she has what she thinks is enough eggs she will sit and not get up much at all for three weeks.

These babies are all "mutts" as all of our chickens are in the pen together. I used to have over a dozen different breeds that I had separated to keep pure.

This mama will stay with the babies until they are a few months old and then she will probably try and sit another nest.

I am glad that you like the pictures!

lawsonmugs

I had some silver laced winedots that looked similar to her only darker. She is so pretty. The chicks are just adorable. I'm excited to get my own again. I always had chickens and been without for maybe 2 years now. I sure miss them. To me they are so relaxing to watch. Like some people like to watch fish. Lynnie about 2 and 1/2 weeks to go till the first calf comes.

lawsonmugs

Just heard on the news tonight a lady not to far from where I live had a sheep give birth to 5 lambs. 4 were black and white and the last one was pure white. just so cute. All looked healthy too. She said it is 1 in a million odds for so many and also for them to servive. The mama had 2 sets of triples before these.

Bilben

Sorry to change the subject, but here is the basket I received from Chasesss. I just love it; i love the colours and I love batiks. I had even thought of doing a woven basket myself, but I went another way. [ATTACH=CONFIG]544937[/ATTACH]

JuneBillie

Bilben that is a beautiful basket from Chasesss. I like the pretty woven green color and cream batiks.

I am still waiting to get the address of my partner. I think she travels some so I am waiting. I have it sitting in front of me.

I grew up loving all the little chickens. My grandfather and grandmother were chicken farmers or as they call it here, chicken growers. Then years later when I was in my teens my parents took over their chicken growing business. A lot of hard work with a chicken house of 10,000 baby chicks delivered, fed, watered, and then sold to marker. Everything between sell offs would have to be redone. I don't know as much as they did, but new shavings put down by the shovel full all through the chicken house. Usually the chicken house shoveled out by hand from the time before due to all the ammonia buildup. Yes, from all the peeing. lol...

When I was 6 years old my grandfather would let me go with him to get a scooper full of feed to pour in a couple of the feeders that hung down. Grandma would let me go down to their barn to get eggs from their laying chickens. I remember feeling all bad when I dropped a egg, and it cracked. lol...

Here are a couple of blocks you ask for Mary.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]544944[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=CONFIG]544945[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=CONFIG]544946[/ATTACH]

Each block is 6" finished. Each one I am doing is paper pieced with tiny pieces, but the one I am working on right now has some of the tiniest pieces I have done yet. They are all part of the FWS 1930 quilt along on the board. Each block will be different, and when they are put into a quilt they will be put in on point. I am planning to make mine for a queen size bed since that is the size bed we have in our master bedroom. Thank you for looking. Oh, the blocks here have not been iron pressed yet. Some leave on the paper pieces and slide them into their notebook covers until they have all 99 blocks complete, and then iron each one before putting their quilt together.