I'm really lucky, living somewhere without many predators and being able to keep them at the community garden.

She's a funny, independent wee thing - if she decides she does or doesn't want to be somewhere, good luck changing her mind! It just so happens that the top of my head is quite often where she wants to be. I've been working on teaching her to step up when I offer, because even a small *surprise chicken!* landing on your head isn't ideal :lol:

Yep - almost got a face full of Mrs Little Chicken tonight! I ducked and she landed on my back instead.

Check feet for poop! All ok though.
 
One has a head spot, so definitely a boy since I have barred pullets but no barred or cuckoo cock(erel)s. The other doesn't, so she's definitely a she because she hatched from an egg I marked as BPR (the barred boy chick hatched from an egg I actually thought was probably laid by one of the Light Sussex, but clearly not!).

I remember collecting the egg the black girl chick hatched from, right after one of my BPR pullets emerged from a nest box shouting about the egg she'd just laid. Shetlands should lay green eggs, so for that to be a Shetland egg you'd need:
Another of the Shetlands to have started laying without me realising (the confirmed layers, I know for a fact all lay green)
AND that Shetland to be laying the same colour as the Barred Rocks, not green like she should
AND the Rock pullet that I thought laid the egg had actually laid a "phantom egg" since there was only one egg in the nest when I collected it (this did actually happen recently but it was obvious that time because the only egg in the nest after she left was green)

So, TLDR: if that's a Shetland cross chick I'll eat my hat, muddy Fayoumi footprints and all :p

The yellow chick DEFINITELY hatched from a green egg, so it can only have been laid by one of the Shetlands. I have a red barnyard mix who lays pale olive, but a different enough shade that it's easy to tell at a glance whose eggs are whose. She sometimes lays slightly more of a pale sage/grey green, but never the green I get from the Shetlands. I do have a wheaten Shetland but I'm fairly sure she hasn't started laying yet, and even more doubtful that she was already laying decent-sized eggs three weeks ago. Could at least one of the Shetlands be something like E/E^Wh or E^R/E^Wh (would that fit the prime suspect pullet in the pics I posted?) and have passed on Wheaten, rather than Extended Black or Birchen, which was then diluted by dad's Silver?
Edit - I wouldn't like to say for sure until s/he feathers out, but the yellow chick also looks like it might be slightly crested, which again could only have come from the Shetlands.
The black with the gold feather shafts has gold leakage. Thus she carries a bit of red....and, I think, managed to pass the red and NOT the black to the yellow chick. Now watch that one feather out something completely different and mix us both up.

Egg color does help sort out the genetics....sometimes....

Any more hatch out?
 

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