Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat

Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: brownysfp on April 29, 2011, 08:02

Title: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: brownysfp on April 29, 2011, 08:02
First of the long weekend's chicks has arrived. I'm desperate not to call it Kate or Wills, I suspect I'm going to be out-voted.
Title: Re: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: lou-b-lou on April 29, 2011, 16:47
I don't think you have a choice!  If they arrived during the wedding then it is meant to be!!!!  :lol:
Title: Re: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: brownysfp on April 29, 2011, 19:09
And the first natural-born chick too; two more pipping and one chipping its way out. Good day so far...
Title: Re: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: bantam novice on April 29, 2011, 20:28
Good luck with the others and keep us posted  :)
Title: Re: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: brownysfp on April 30, 2011, 08:04
And a third hatched during the night. A fourth (the second non-incubator) chick had to taken from mum after she trampled it fighting with another hen who attempted to lay next to her. So, three thriving, one poorly. A fifth has started to hatch as I write.
Title: Re: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: brownysfp on April 30, 2011, 21:39
Now we are five. Tomorrow we will be six or maybe seven. Of the ten eggs in the coop (four under one Coucou, six under another) only one was infertile. So fingers x'd for a bumper harvest.
Tomorrow is Neuvic's Coq de Peche fete - it used to be a celebration of the Limousin Fishing Cock but it's become more commercial over the years. Still, there should be some birds there - if not, I've a tentative order for a dozen eggs from a breeder in Haute-Vienne. 
Title: Royal Wedding / long weekend peeps
Post by: brownysfp on May 01, 2011, 11:12
Back from the Coq de Peche fair, deafened by a marquee of antsy roos yelling at each other! Plenty of cocks but very few hens and those were relatively expensive.
Straight to the incubator to find two more chicks: two more Coucous, I think. Running total: one Brahma, two ISAs, and four Coucous.
Title: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: brownysfp on May 02, 2011, 18:48
And a final ISA to round off a successful hatching weekend. Eight chicks in the brooder, all looking fit and healthy.
Title: Re: Royal Wedding peeps
Post by: brownysfp on May 03, 2011, 21:17
Kerfuffle in the coop as the Coucous piled into each other. Hard to say if it was the storm that spooked them or the new hatchling I discovered when I separated them.
The thunder was drowned by the screeching of infuriated hens. The new chick is now in the brooder with the incubator boys and girls. Nine chicks and another peeping in the incubator!