The First Babies Arrive!

Today saw the day the first ducklings hatched. I managed to coax broody hen off her nest this morning for some corn. She allowed me to examine some of the eggs. I noticed that two had a fair size hole in them and that one other had obvious cracks! Then followed an agonising afternoon at work and some very quick food shopping.

When I got home (with some very excited children) we brought broody hen's cat box into the kitchen to check on the eggs. Wearing my chicken wrangling gloves I bravely lifted her gently from the nest. There lay two little fluffy ducklings! Quickly checking the other eggs I noticed the one with the crack noted earlier hadn't changed so I eased the shell open slightly to see it wriggling inside. I quickly candled two eggs and saw that one duckling was moving strongly and one not so much. The other egg I have no idea. I will check again in the morning.

Proud mum

Little cutie

So tired

Brand new

Poultry Matters and a Missing Cat

Well I picked up the new quail hens last night. All didn't go exactly to plan. Dude was moved to his new hutch with the established females. Sanchez was given the new hens. At first he thought it was wonderful, being male he introduced himself just how a virile male should! Wonderful, I thought, he's pleased with his pressie. Funnily enough Dude did the same thing with his girls, and I'd not seen either of them do it before!! It must be all to do with new territory and new blood.

Anyway ten minutes later and Sanchez was pecking the hell out of the new hens! My cousin had told me how violent they can be but I didn't expect him to be like that with his girlfriends! So Sanchez spent a night in solitary in the shed, partly to give the girls time to settle in and partly so he can think about what he has done!

This morning I have clipped his beak just a little bit and popped him back in. Things seem to be much calmer today, he is chasing them around a bit but doesn't seem to be trying to peck their heads off!

My new Cayuga duck eggs are now in the incubator, a nice Brinsea 20 borrowed from a friend. At least I don't have to turn the eggs. My other incubator currently holding 6 Maran and 7 Pheasant eggs is manual and that's quite a chore to remember to turn them all 3 times a day! And we are only on day 5! Now all that's bothering me is that 28 days is so long!!

At least my Indian Runners are nearly cooked. They are due this weekend, so expect some wonderfully over the top posting from me in a few days! I have had a few panics about them hatching. I bought them from Ebay and was ecstatic to find all six were fertile and developing well. Trouble is when they are under a broody you can't monitor the hatch very well, and I am worried that they will not have been moist enough. I really don't want to lose them at the last minute! Ducks is new to me so it's all trial and error.

On a different note, the family is sad, we have lost one of our dear Bengal cats. He has been missing for over a month now. Just went off one day and didn't come back! A Bengal was found a couple of weeks ago in a village not far from here but was sadly not ours. He had been missing from elsewhere for 3 months though. It does give us a bit of hope that he will stroll back in one day or that someone will find him and check him for a microchip. All we can do is wait.....