The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: Roxy on May 17, 2011, 01:21:11 pm
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My first hatch of the year. Been hatching them years, and still gives me great joy to hear that first cheep, and the hen cluck to her new chicks. I always feel pleased for the bantam that has sat so patiently three weeks ......only ever had one failure, when only one chick hatched, and then later that day I found it dead .......think the hen squashed it.
Could see two yellow faces peeping out when I last looked. The other bantam should not be far behind. These two are sitting on mixed lot of bantam and cream legbar eggs.
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Our first clutch of the season appeared on Saturday from out of the undergrowth, coinciding with a visit from three of our smaller grandchildren. What joy :) :) :) they were spellbound. The chicks, Scots Greys, are like little dark bumblebees. We scooped them all up and into a coop - all 12 are doing well and mum is only slightly annoyed at being confined. :chook:
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I love it ;D
Got ducklings in the gill, ducklings in a pen at the front of the house, the goose sitting on eggs. Big chicks in a pen in the yard, middle-sized chicks in another pen in the front of the house and little chicks in a cage in the hall ;D A distinct improvement on when most of them were in the kitchen a couple of weeks ago :D
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ahhh!
I've got legbars in my plans for the future - love the idea of blue-y eggs!
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Well, being lttle blue, you must have some blue eggs!! May be able to sort you some blue eggs.
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Banties have brought their chicks off the nest now. One has 6, and one egg unhatched. The other has 4, one unhatched egg, and one dead chick in the nest (a large one - one of the live ones is really tiny, but seems active enough!)
Neither of the unhatched eggs were the blue eggs, so seemingly I should have 6 cream legbar chicks. 9 of the chicks are yellow, and one all brown. As I understand it, female legbar chicks have two stripes down the back? In which case it looks like I have one pullet and 5 cockerels .......arggggghhhhh - surely not?!!!! I know you can expect some cockerels, but I could have expected 2 or maybe 3 pullets?
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Hi Roxy
I would be interested in one of your legbar cockerels if you don't have plans for them, been looking for one but up to now they have all been miles away :chook:
Hatty
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You are more than welcome to a cockerel, Hattie!! We will see what happens - maybe they will all turn out to be pullets (I wish!)
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First successful brood I had, I'd been told the chicks would be sex-linked but stupidly hadn't asked how I would tell.
There were 4 chicks. 2 had feathery legs, 2 smooth. 2 had rose combs, 2 straight. Making 4 different birds - feathery legs / rose comb, feathery legs / straight comb, smooth legs / rose comb, smooth legs / straight comb. I bet the feathery legged ones were the girls, BH the straight combs ones were the boys.
Time passed, the birds grew. Some fighting began. Some birds' feet seemed bigger... Eventually we accepted the awful truth, 4 cocks. ::) Never mind, they tasted good... :yum: