My babies are having babies
.
I set my own eggs in the bator almost 3 weeks ago. A few days later my Wheaten
pullet Ophelia (Opie) went broody so I gave her some of her own eggs from the bator.
Our baby Mia (just 24 weeks old and has only been laying for a month) would sit on
Opie's eggs whenever Opie took a break. Mia has always been the little copycat. She was
the only chick to hatch under a broody Buff Orp (they were shipped during a heat wave)
and followed her Momma around until I separated them after three months. It was
hilarious to watch. Mama would scratch, Mia would scratch, Mama would preen, Mia
would preen. Mama would look into the next pen, baby Mia would have to look too:
Mama would give me the stink eye, Mia would give me the baby stink eye:
So now Mia has decided she wants to be a Mom also. After Opie kicked her out of the
nest box for several days and Mia stayed in her own box on a golf ball for several days, I
slipped some of her own half incubated eggs under her. She's is sticking like glue to
them, and looking quite pleased
.
Baby Mia, all grown up:
I'm going to let them all stay in the pen and raise them together if all goes well.
They have a huge run and a 2 story coop. I'll move mama and babies to the bottom level
after hatch. I just have two other pullets in there as well as Ranger the roo:
Excuse their scraggly beards, beard feathers must be tastier than other feathers
.
I think he will be a good baby daddy. When the girls first started laying, and were
dropping eggs in the run, he would sit in the nest box to show 'em where to lay.
When the girls are laying, he will stand next to them and talk encouragingly
.
We focus a lot on egg color and body conformation here...just thought I share
another side of this breed....awesome personalties!
