"Mamading's" Farm
Welcome to my page. I live in north central wisconsin. I'm a work at home mom to three kids: Boys- 13 and 9 and girl- 1. My husband grew up helping his mom with her little farm of horses, chickens, and pigs. So he has a little experience in all this. One day this past April he brought home 50+ fertilized quail eggs. I was caught off guard. I had no idea what I was doing but decided to "wing" it. We set them up in the incubator and made sure we turned them by hand each day. Mean while I jumped online and started doing some research. Not much out there about game bird egg hatching. Well we ended up with 7 babies when all was said and done on Mother's Day. You'll see their pictures below. I've since found more helpful information so hopefully the second batch of 24 eggs is a little more successfull. I told my husband to please not bring anymore home. This incubating eggs deal is stressful. I can't stand the waiting and the worrying if they're ok and wondering if I'm incubating for nothing.
Now I'm hooked. I want some chickens. So I ordered 12 pullets (6 Rhode Island Reds and 6 Barred Plymouth Rocks) from my local feed store. They get their chicks from Sunnyside Hatchery in Beaver Dam, WI. The "cheekas" (as I fondly call them already) were supposed to be here on friday June 1st. The feed store called to tell me that they won't be here till monday or tuesday because of the memorial day holiday slowing mail down and the fact that they didn't have enough RIR to send me at that time. So I'm hoping to get the call I'm waiting for monday morning. Probably won't be till tuesday but we can all dream can't we?!
For now check out my babies below. If any one is interested I would be glad to give you some of my quail. If all 24 eggs hatch around the 12th and are healthy I will have to give some up. I can't house them with my "cheekas" so please help me out.
Here are the new babies just hatched Mother's Day morning.
There is some wet and tired ones in the front.
These two eggers didn't make it. They got too exhausted trying to get through the tough quail egg membrane. The big dark eggs in the back are pheasant eggs which are about the same size as a small chicken egg. Major difference in size. When the quail hatch they're about 1-2 inches small.
Here they are in their new "digs". More room for them to run, hop, and flutter-fly up to about 2 feet now.
Chow time!!
Here is the last batch of quail eggs due to hatch around the 12th of June. Any takers if they make it?
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
Well my chicks finally arrived. I got the call this morning from my feed store and rushed out the door to get them. They are all doing great! Only one of the 12 had pasty butt. I took care of most of it (as much as she would let me, painful I'm sure). They all took to eating and drinking right away. Now I had ordered 6 Rhode Island Reds and 6 Barred Plymouth Rocks. I had looked at a lot of pictures of what these breeds would look like as chicks. The RIRs are supposed to be a rusty color. 3 out of the 6 RIRs are quite yellow and pale. This leads me to believe that they'll be white when they're grown. Oh well no biggy. Just makes it a colorful flock.
Oooo look! Food! So glad we're here after that bumpy ride.
Here they are getting used to their new temporary home.
I took this picture through the side of their plastic brooder. Notice the one that is taking "bottoms up" literally.
Can't get enough of that food. They ate a lot after they got first drink of water after their journey.
Another shot from the side for a close up.
I've been really enjoying them all day today. So funny when they fall asleep standing up, then they slowly start to tip forward like a teapot and sleep through the whole thing.
More pictures to come as they grow. We are in the process of building their coop and run. I will post all the pictures of the process from beginning to end after it's complete.
