Babies, babies, babies

Several weeks ago, I mentioned to my friend Jennifer from Slow Food Farms that we had several broody hens.    She offered some fertile eggs (she has a rooster...we don't) for the broody hens to sit on.   We placed a dozen eggs in 6 different nest boxes in the mothership and selected our cranky broody hens to sit on them.   We marked on the calendar 21 days and the journey began.   The whole process is fasinating, but there are some particular notes of interest.   The hens sit most of the day and night on the nest, only occasionally getting up to potty, drink and eat.  Ours seemed to get up first thing in the morning when the coop was opened.   The hens know to keep a certain temperature on the eggs.  When they need warmth, they fan their feathers and make a big fluffy tent to cover.  If the eggs are warm enough, they'll stand up a little over the top with their wings jutting out.   The hens are the best incubators, they turn the eggs and will kick a egg out that is rotten!   Finally this past Monday evening, we opened the nest box to discover a little chick!    Like two kids on Christmas morning, the next day  we scrambled out to see if there were more.    5 more!   Wednesday brought us 3 more chicks, and as of this morning, Thursday August 11th, there is one little fluffy baby in there.    We are very excited that our first hatch has brought us this many chicks so far.   And with great probability, we will have a rooster and can start the process all over again soon.

In addition to baby chicks, we have a new calf on the farm.    And it is a HE.   After the incident with the vet, we carefully checked the sex on our new miniature hereford calf.    We knew her mother Betty was expecting.....she looked like she going to explode with milk the past few days.    It is a hot dog day of summer to be giving birth, but the calf looks healthy and beautiful.   And like Ward says...we have another mouth to feed.    We have been feeding hay for many weeks now to the cattle.   We had them on a rotation of fields, but alas, we're at the end of the rotation and the grass on the beginning fields is not sturdy enough for them to come back.   So they are in an upper part of our property that has the last bit of grass and now a big hay ring.    This is the best area for them to camp out for awhile.  There are quite a bit of trees, and the shady glen was perfect for Betty to have her calf.   We're hoping in a few more weeks, the heat will break and bring the animals and US relief.