Once upon a time (last winter to be exact) I brough home an 8 week old light brahma bantam rooster for my beloved hen snowflake. I spent a few weeks with Elvis in the brooder with another boy I brought home (I needed another rooster like I needed a hole in the head at that time) but I am sooo madly in love with the brahmas I just couldn't pass him up. He became the sweetest boy and went on to move in with the other chickens now that he was bigger. Snowflake fell ill with internal laying issues that I couldn't fix. She soon passed away at the age of 3 years old. Elvis was now without a partner and soo sad he lost his buddy. There were several hens to choose from so he went for the ugliest homely frizzle hen I had here. Curly sue didn't care much for elvis but she really enjoyed him warming up her nest before she got ready to lay an egg. Elvis wasn't interested in ANY other hen, he fell head over heels for curly sue. One morning I went to turn on the light in their coop and noticed curly sue had a prolapse. I tried everything to fix it with no luck, she had to be culled. We had a big flower pot filled with pine shavings as her nest, only she layed in that nest, noone else liked it. In that nest I found 4 eggs. I wasn't set up for hatching at that time as all my brooders were being occupied by the seramas for winter. However my dear sweet serama hen ebony who lost her life to a hawk recently was broody at that time so I thought awww heck I'll just give these 4 eggs to ebony. 21 days later she hatched out all 4 babies, cute little yellow chicks with pea combs just like their papa.
Shortly after the kids were hatched elvis started acting up and beating on the roosters and the hens so I made the tough decision to let him go. I brought him to a friend of mine who runs a petting zoo and horse stables. When i put him in that coop he tried to jump up on me begging me to take him back home
I went to alk out the door and get in the car to get out of there so my friend didn't see the tears building up in my eyes. I heard him cry for me as I was leaving but I just knew I had to be strong and leave him or i'd have a whole lot of troubles at home. That broke my heart. All was not lost tho, I still had 4 beautiful happy, healthy little fuzzballs. Time went on and ebony and her clutch spent alot of time free ranging outside, those babies were learning the ropes quick. At about 1 month old I saw that I had 2 cockrels and 2 pullets out of that bunch. I had no room for more heartbreaking cockrels so I decided to sell the 2 boys at the swap. One of the 2 boys had half of his body frizzled and the other half was straight feathered, the other boy was a spitting image of his father. The 2 girls of ccourse I kept back. One is straight feathered and the other is beautifully frizzled unlike her mama who had hard course, brittle feathers and appeared to be a double frizz. I named the 2 dumplin and grace.
These 2 stole my heart and their foster mothers temperment definately rubbed off on them. AFter 2 months ebony decided to move on and let the chicks be. They became really attatched to me and followed me everywhere, they wanted nothing more then to be held all the time. I loved that! So of course every chance I had to spend with them I did. I couldn't get enough of them. They not only reminded me of the 2 hens I lost but both turned out just like their papa who could have easily won at shows. This is a pic of him warming up the nest for one of the girls.
This is a pic of curly sue when she was still just a baby (the one in front) and her brother Mr fancypants.
Dumplin (straight feathered) and Grace (frizzled) go everywhere together and are sooo tightly bonded it's crazy. They started laying eggs not tooo long ago and within a week grace went broody. Dumplin was lost without her sister so she decided the next day to join her sister in the nesting box.
This time of year I don't hatch any chicks because I don't want to put em up in the house for the entire winter therefor dumplin and grace are sitting on air. Hopefully they snap out of it soon nand enjoy foraging in the yard before it's covered in 5 ft of snow. I just adore these 2 girls to pieces and thought I'd share my story with my fellow chicken lovers
Shortly after the kids were hatched elvis started acting up and beating on the roosters and the hens so I made the tough decision to let him go. I brought him to a friend of mine who runs a petting zoo and horse stables. When i put him in that coop he tried to jump up on me begging me to take him back home
These 2 stole my heart and their foster mothers temperment definately rubbed off on them. AFter 2 months ebony decided to move on and let the chicks be. They became really attatched to me and followed me everywhere, they wanted nothing more then to be held all the time. I loved that! So of course every chance I had to spend with them I did. I couldn't get enough of them. They not only reminded me of the 2 hens I lost but both turned out just like their papa who could have easily won at shows. This is a pic of him warming up the nest for one of the girls.
This is a pic of curly sue when she was still just a baby (the one in front) and her brother Mr fancypants.
Dumplin (straight feathered) and Grace (frizzled) go everywhere together and are sooo tightly bonded it's crazy. They started laying eggs not tooo long ago and within a week grace went broody. Dumplin was lost without her sister so she decided the next day to join her sister in the nesting box.
This time of year I don't hatch any chicks because I don't want to put em up in the house for the entire winter therefor dumplin and grace are sitting on air. Hopefully they snap out of it soon nand enjoy foraging in the yard before it's covered in 5 ft of snow. I just adore these 2 girls to pieces and thought I'd share my story with my fellow chicken lovers
