Pipd's Peeps!

[TheChickenQueen]

I wouldn't bet on Flurry being a boy, this age is rather tricky to try figuring out who is what.

The only one I noticed was Rooska with her odd build, for a orpington of her type she doesn't really look the part. They should be heavier without much tail feathers whereas she looks almost like a lighter breed. But that could change

I feel your pain right now, as I only bought 5 known pullets this year; ended up losing 3 early on then my ee ended up being a boy!

So everyone else is straight run, even with the pullets I hatched late March I still second guess them from time to time. Ugh I hate this.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

I know, but she's so pink already... I'm trying my best to sit it out and wait for definite signs, but I don't want to hold my breath on it. I guess it's really bugging me because I was happy to have another big, fluffy, feathery-footed splash hen. Oh, well. At the very least, AS LONG AS THE REST OF THEM ARE PULLETS (excluding Donnie, of course), this is only the first mistake out of four orders from Meyer's, so I guess I can't complain. Also, if Flury is a boy and Cazzie is a girl, I can hatch out more blue and splash Cochins from them. And Silkie-Cochin mixes, which are adorable--although with Reub and his sons, I suppose I could hatch mixes from them either way.


Oh, I have awful luck with straight run. I have gotten a grand total of ONE hen out of all the straight run chicks I've ever bought. :/ But at least when I have hatched chicks I've ended up with exactly 50-50 so far. Fingers crossed for the same (or better!) with yours! Nothing is worse than those weeks you spend wondering if they're pullets or not so you know whether or not you can get attached to them...

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Pictures today! Not as many as usual, but pictures nonetheless! The babies had a good couple hours out in the grass to run around. I brought Crash with and even put her in the pen with them for a short while. I had honestly expected her to throw a hissy fit and go after the babies because she's super touchy about things, but what actually happened was that the babies came over and poked at her curiously, and she high-tailed it like she was being mobbed by a set of ferocious velociraptors.

Poor li'l ducky, those are scary babies!

Anyway, I tried to get pictures of Flury to show what I was talking about with her facial color, but naturally the camera flash washed out most of the color in her pictures. I swear, I'm not crazy!

Regardless, she's still an impressively floofy young Cochin. (Yep, we're going with she for now.)

I only took a handful of pictures beyond that because my camera space is running low again. ARG! Here's what I got, though.

Izzy-bizzy. This was like half a second before she took off flying from that spot.

Izzy again. It takes a lot of work to maintain her feathers for such sporadic flights.

Umru sun bathing. Umru looks like a train wreck right now.

Endymion. Look at this sweet bird, looking up at me with her big eyes! She has to make up somehow for pooping all over my floor! Endymion decided over the past day or two that she can come and go from the brooder as she pleases, so I had to cover it today. There were too many close calls of me nearly stepping in her leavings in the carpet.

Lydda, not doing anything suspicious!

Lydda again. Snuggle time!

Rooska takes her snuggles pretty seriously, too. Such a doll.

And that's it. I'm going to have to clean out the memory of my camera again now. It occurs to me that I haven't gotten pictures of the Silkie fuzzies in a while! Oops! We'll see if I can remedy that this weekend.




Oh, and if anyone wondered, I caught up my 100 Pictures of my Flock page to my most recent pictures today. I'd been neglecting it a bit there. But it's up to date now.

 

[pattyhen]

Great pic of Crash she looks like she just finished eatting. Poor baby being attacked by all those chicks no wonder she took off.

Umru looks like she has been plucked. It's hard to pluck a chicken tho that doesn't have feathers.

Flurry is beautiful. I wouldn't worry about her facial color. She's a girl keeping fingers crossed that she is.

Endy is so pretty and look at those legs. No wonder she is flying out of the brooder. There is always one in the group that spoils it for everyone. She is a cutie.

Thanks so much for the sharing the pics love them all.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Haha, yes, Umru really does look plucked! My brother was out there when I brought the chicks out that day and he kept saying she was going to roast herself in the sun like a turkey dinner. My response was that, well, she is already pretty much table ready, between her size and how few feathers she has!


I'm going to go with that Flury is a girl, at least until I see more convicting evidence to the contrary. Kind of like I did with Marge, whose full name ended up being Margaret Until Proven Otherwise because I was so worried she was a cockerel. I get so wrapped up in whether they're male or female sometimes that I just have to make myself step back and take a deep breath. They're going to be what they're going to be no matter how much I worry about it. Flury's awfully adorable either way. When I was out with the babies yesterday, she stood right in front of me and just let me stroke her soft feathers for such a long time... She started off so standoffish, I'm glad she finally warmed up to me.



I moved the babies' outside pen yesterday to be along side the garden, so I was able to make it a lot larger by incorporating the garden fence as one wall of it. The babies had a blast flying around, and they finally got to have a REAL dust bath in REAL dirt, too! Then Endymion hopped into my lap after having a dust bath and left me covered in dirt. But no real complaints on that because she's a cutie either way. They had fun anyway. There was a moment when a rabbit went by and freaked them all out so badly that they all packed into the cat carrier I use to bring them in and out from the brooder. They give me such a fight to get them in it that I thought it was hilarious to see them all go in willingly!

They're getting so big now. It's probably about time they got full day trips outside on their own, but I need to set up a more secure pen for that than the flimsy white fence I have for them now. I guess I could work on that today... SIGH. My babies are growing up already!

 

[pattyhen]

That is so funny about them going in on their own in the cat carrier. A big scarey rabbit and it's time to go back in the house where it is safe.

I wouldn't worry about Flurry she is going to be what she is. Worrying isn't going to change a thing. She sounds like such a sweetheart. If by some slim chance she is a boy she'll have Donnie to pal around with.

It's hard to get a secure pen. They seem to be able to squeeze threw the littlest spaces. I think we had more trouble keeping the ducks secured then the chickens tho.

We;ve had two wild mallards visiting the yard lately. The male stands guard over her and doesn't let any of the ducks get near her. That's good because I can just see my drakes mating with her and she flies off and leaves the babies behind that can't fly. The female is so little but the male is huge and has that green color on his head. I told them they could visit but they can't live here. 15 ducks is plenty I don't need anymore.

Hope you have a great day and give the babies a hug from me.

 

[Cluckcluck1215]

That is so funny about them going in on their own in the cat carrier.  A big scarey rabbit and it's time to go back in the house where it is safe.  

I wouldn't worry about Flurry she is going to be what she is.  Worrying isn't going to change a thing.  She sounds like such a sweetheart.  If by some slim chance she is a boy she'll have Donnie to pal around with.  

It's hard to get a secure pen.  They seem to be able to squeeze threw the littlest spaces.  I think we had more trouble keeping the ducks secured then the chickens tho.  

We;ve had two wild mallards visiting the yard lately.  The male stands guard over her and doesn't let any of the ducks get near her.  That's good because I can just see my drakes mating with her and she flies off and leaves the babies behind that can't fly.  The female is so little but the male is huge and has that green color on his head.  I told them they could visit but they can't live here.  15 ducks is plenty I don't need anymore.  

Hope you have a great day and give the babies a hug from me.  

Wow!you have 15 ducks! that's a lot!i only have 2 ducks,and they make a mess!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

15 is pretty impressive! I only have 3, but I've been thinking about a couple more... But then again, one in particular of my three ducks sure is a whole lot of work all on her own.


I haven't been able to get pictures of the babies yet thanks to a complete lack of camera memory at this point, but they are 5 weeks old today! It was storming pretty bad this afternoon, so I wasn't able to get them outside. I went up there to sit with them in the brooder instead, but didn't stay long because Rooska let loose one of the nastiest poops ever RIGHT ON MY LAP. I felt bad that I didn't spend a lot of time with them today, but I had a mess to clean up. I think tomorrow I'm going to put them in the pen that Margie was in with her babies and see how they do. I'll see if I can clear enough space on the camera to take pictures of that!

Anyway, I'm pretty proud of the little munchkins tonight! They perched all on their own on the sticks I put in the brooder! All except Umru and Flury. Flury's a little overly dramatic and was practically wailing because all her friends had disappeared (all of a few inches above her head). Meanwhile, Umru just seemed confused about it all. I finally convinced Umru to hop up to roost and Flury knocked poor Lydda down, so she had to perch on the EcoGlow because there wasn't any more space on the lower roost. Cazzie was the only one that made it up to the higher, longer perch. Oh, well, they'll get the hang of it. I'm still proud that they've started doing it all on their own!



And Lady Wyandotte is STILL brooding. I think she's going for an all-time record.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Today, I did move the babies to where Margie was with the Silkie fuzzies, and I think they had a blast with all the room. I fenced off an area within that pen so that they couldn't go too far (because it's overgrown and I didn't want to have to search through a jungle to find them!), so they had a space of about 15 by 5 feet, maybe a little narrower in a few spots. This area is more secure because it has sturdy welded wire fence outside of it, and it has a lot of cover for safety and deep grass for the babies to disappear into. Which means that I guess they'll be able to be outside on their own very soon. My babies!


So I took pictures while they were out with me, and then after a nice, long playtime, I brought them back in to the brooder for the night. I then sat and relaxed for about an hour before it was time to get Crash up to bed and close the coops for the night. When I took Crash upstairs, I noticed the sheet over the brooder was knocked down, so I checked on the chicks to make sure they were all in the brooder where they belong. To my absolute horror, Umru was nowhere to be seen. After glancing around the room quickly, I had the horrifying thought that what if I miscounted and forgot to bring Umru in? And the worst part was that I left the pen that they were in open after I brought them in and didn't think twice about it at the time! Umru could have been anywhere if she was outside!

After a quick search outside with the big flashlight, during which I was practically sobbing with worry, I came back in to search my room again because I could swear I saw Umru come out of the cat carrier inside when I brought them in. I looked everywhere in my room, even places I know the chicks can't get to. No sign of Umru! Finally, I looked over the brooder again, and that's when I heard the tarp crinkle at the opposite end of the brooder from where the rest of the chicks were. Umru had somehow gotten between the wall and the tarp and couldn't get back out again.



All of my birds are safe and sound tonight. I counted all of them several times to be sure. And that includes a certain troublemaking little featherless Brahma.




Aaaanyway, on to the pictures I got today! First off, each of the babies at 5 weeks and 1 day old (since I missed exactly 5 weeks... )! Getting them to pose in my lap anymore is impossible (if you couldn't tell by the past few weeks' pictures), so I just grabbed pictures of them on the ground when I could.

Miss Callette:

\


Cazzie Darling:

Donnie Boy Blue (his band isn't as tight as it looks in this picture--trust me, I checked immediately after taking it!) :

Endymion, the exception to their pictures 'on the ground':

Fabulous Flury:

My little Izzy-bizzy:

Precious Lydda:

Beautiful Rooska:

And the gawky one, Umru:

A few more pictures. Here's Endymion and Cazzie on the cat carrier:

Endymion again. The pen they were in this afternoon is right beside the chicken yard, so they were getting a lot of looks, especially from the Silkie fuzzies who didn't seem to appreciate having anyone younger in the flock than them. It was thanks to the funny looks from the Silkie that I realized that the nickname I had given Endymion, Endy, sounds an awful lot like Indigo's nickname, Indi. So I've been moving away from Endy as a nickname for her, and thinking about maybe Dym or Dymi instead.

And then there's Cazzie, showing her usual amount of attitude.

Cazzie found a rock. No idea why she wanted to stand on it so badly, but she found it first!

My pretty Rooska coming over.

Flury. Did I mention how fabulous she is? This is her showing it.

She then hopped into my lap and became a puddle of floofiness.

My darling Callette. Lydda was too busy flying around in all their space, but Callette made time for some cuddles.

"Less pictures, more cuddles."

Rooska was snuggly, too.

And this is what happens when Izzy doesn't get enough attention, I guess. Up on my shoulder again. I love how her beard is coming in, though, in those little tufts on the sides of her face!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

I also wanted to post a couple videos I took early this morning of the two young Silkie boys crowing! Here is Winter's song:


[VIDEO]

And Big Ben! As a bonus, Reuben crows just a few seconds before Benjamin does in this video:


[VIDEO]