Late Summer Hatch: The Beginning

Now we know for sure Jersey is a layer.  Ironically, she is the largest chicken and lays the smallest egg.

Labelle's babies are due to hatch this week.  I had two that were due today.  One, it is assumed, started peeping, and Myrtle and Labelle fought over it, giving me this...

The chick survived this for many hours, but eventually dried out when it broke through the lining.  There was a suggestion to put it in the incubator with the humidity turned high.  If this happens again, I'll be sure to remember the advice and try it.

When I went out this morning to check, I discovered the stiff remains of the above egg and a live chick.  The live chick looks like her blue brother hatched by Poof.

 

Under the building, every one prefers to spend their time taking dirt baths.

Daisy prefers to take naps in their pool.

Broody Girls, Laying Girls, Happy Girls

Broody Girls

Myrtle, the recently named Splash OE, has been stealing Labelle's nest.  Here, you see she has taken over.  There must have been a bit of a skuffle since Labelle's apron was askew.  The thing is, Myrtle isn't truly broody.  She just likes to steal the nest, sit on it a while, and she doesn't stay on.  I have to go out several times a day and knock her out.  She hasn't added any more eggs to the clutch, and after candling them yesterday, we  

Calamity Jane, the darker EE, is laying her egg.  I thought she may be going broody since I had gotten two blue eggs, but she hadn't laid hers yet.

Spaz refuses to lay in the coop.  I've had to close her up until afternoon so she won't lay under the storage building.

 I moved the nest when I candled the eggs last night.

....  and it happened again.

 Another note, look who has started laying!  Blue, the younger OE.  I guess she's about 20 weeks old or so...  Oddly, the OE is not laying olive eggs, but blue!  Even more blue than Spaz.  LOL

Blue's egg

Don't mind the brown egg.  The green egg on the left came from Myrtle.  The aqua mint egg on the right is from Spaz.  The minty blue came from Blue.  Legitimately, she is no longer an OE.  LOL

This is yesterday afternoon's cache of eggs.  Two duck eggs and five chicken.  I went back out last night to close up the coop and I had another blue egg and a brown egg.

Terra wanted to help.

Ducks