The chicks are getting big enough that when I unzip the top of the little nylon and mesh pen that they are in, they start flying out, up onto the edge, and then right up onto my shoulders! Ohhh, my heart! 😍

I have to make sure that I I'm wearing a crummy shirt and have sanitizing wipes nearby, because they are absolute poop machines.

But oh my gosh, they are so stinking cute! I'll try to put a video up on my Loops tomorrow.

Peanut is finally starting to get tail feathers! He's still VERY tiny, and he's still very much acting like a rooster. He's also not nearly as friendly and inquisive as the girls are.

Poor little guy. I'm really not sure what I will do with him when the time to re-home him comes. I've even looked into anti-crow collars already. They don't really do much good. 😩

#ChickensOfMastodon #FediChooks

Molly is maybe too interested in the babies? I can't tell if she's trying to guard them or if she wants to eat them. I think it's guarding.

I put the chicks in a laundry basket briefly today so my family could come see them. That gave me a chance to better clean their current enclosure.
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One of my "packing peanut" chicks did not make it.

He had been acting kind of sickly yesterday anyway, and today he really took a turn for the worse.

I took the mama hen out because I think she was part of the problem. She really didn't want to be a surrogate mother.

Now all the little ladies are screaming their heads off because they want their mama back. I'm not sure what to do about that! I do have a heat plate in there for them.

The others are doing just fine, so far, including the tiny tiny tiny extra one. I'm rooting for him so hard.

Sad day, though. Chickens are heartbreakers.

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I have outsmarted* the chickens. A few months back, they started ignoring the rollout nesting box in favor of just laying them in the pine shavings.
Which would be fine, except the mobile coop, which is still parked for the winter, is 10 feet deep and they lay on the far end so I have to use a telescoping arm with a cup on the end to fetch eggs.
Picked up a newer, fancier nesting box and installed in on the near end of the tractor a few weeks back and last night, I blocked out their laying corner with a heavy bit of cardboard to force them to lay elsewhere.
Lots of angry squawking this morning and three girls are piled into the 4 inch angled corner that is less exposed (the black and white barred rock is end of the laying train)
Checked back out there, I'm "short" three chickens and have two very concerned layers looking at the enclosed space.
*sigh*
They managed to bully their way through the barrier and are crammed into the corner to lay their eggs.

* I did not

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TODAY IS BABY CHICK DAY!

I did not expect them today, but I rolled with it. They were delivered via courier service from Iowa. They left yesterday afternoon and they all seem to be in pretty good shape! There is one of them that looks a day younger, and I'm betting that that's an unsexed bird and a rooster. I don't know why we got an extra on top of that. But the extra extra looks like the same breed as the ones my neighbor ordered. Only two of them are mine, but I'm going to hand raise them all summer so that they are gentle, sweet birds when she gets back from work in Michigan in September.

I set them up in a nylon pen on a table in the kitchen which is tempting the kittens, but they're not gonna be able to get in there or tip the pen over.

They've got a heat plate instead of a mama and they've already started pecking at their food.

I'm not going to put a mama hen in with them because nobody went broody this spring. I tried to entice at least one of my girls to do so, but it didn't work (the technique is to leave wooden eggs in one of the nest boxes and see if one of the hens gathers everybody's eggs every day and sits on them. One of mine was sort of doing that? But she didn't fight me when I gathered eggs, so she was not ready).

Also, I don't want anything that my birds might have to infect these little babies, so there is that consideration.

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