Wild chicken on my property! has chicks, what to do?,if anything?

I'm quite surprised, to say the least!!!

I was outside refilling my cats water container on my porch, the ducks were off somewhere else on the property so it was quiet, except for a few frogs singing because of the storm blowing in, but as I listened, I heard something else, it sounded like baby starlings somewhere, but it's a bit late for nestlings around here, the last batches of fledgings around my house fledged some weeks ago, anyway.

so I step off the porch and head for the trees in back on the house, and I hear,not a couple, but sounds like a whole hoarde of little peeping things!, as a walk alittle farther into the treeline, i heard like, "buk buk buk buk buk buk", real low and steady like along with the peeping.

that is when i saw her!, there was a CHICKEN scratching and pecking in the leaves under a tree! with a bunch of little balls moving around by her feet!, I got a little closer to see that the chicken is large, I'm guessing a standard breed?, she LOOKS abit like a speckled sussex, which had me all giddy btw, but she's only slightly lighter, like an orange color and not like the deep mahogony color of the speckled sussexs, and she has a bunch of white and black speckles, and a black rimmed tail?

her chicks, are ALL black and have little white spots on their heads, except one which is yellowy/brown with a black/dark brown stripe down it's back, they're tiny, I'd say if you took one, and rolled it into a perfect ball, head and all, about the size of golf balls, and there are inbetween 18 and 20 of them!, yes I said 20!, i counted twice, the first time i got 18, the second i got 20 .

I watched them for a while, they were quite cute as mom scratched around, and apparently found something tasty, because she would lower her head and go "bukbukbukbuk" real high pitched and all the little chicks would cluster around her

I've never had chickens, so it's all new to me.

they're scared poopless of people, even mom when i dared to get alittle closer raised her head and let out this long trill, at which all the chicks gathered around her?, and she moved off with them,.

as the storm rolled in she herded them towards my duck shed, and waited until they were all with her, and pushed her way underneath with all her babies following.

now, is there anything I should do for them while they are here?, will they stay safe under the shed?, do I need to/should I feed them?, mom looks like she's doing a good job, and as far as I could tell,she and her babies where in good health, moms feathers looked alittle ragged, but then, so don't my ducks this time of year.

now, here the WIERD part, i got NO idea where these came from!, there is no one around here for about a mile and a half, but the clostest person I KNOW of who has chickens, is about 3 miles, and I don't think a lone chicken could have travled that far?

this is one of those times I wish i had a camera!

any help is appriciated!

I figure they'll move on, or I'm a new chicken owner!

 

Should I just give them table scraps if I do decide to feed them? I don't have any chick feed as of now, because I not hatching ducklings anymore this year, i'm all hatched out after my last batch of 20 didn't sell as well as I'd have liked , i finally got the rest except one I kept sold off at auction the other month. and I feed layer pellets, which are too big for the chicks

as cool as it would be to have a whole flock basically free one day, I know that as they grow they won't be free lol, and it'll be atleast 6 months before I'd get any eggs, correct?, atleast thats how ducks are, I've heard this whole 16 weeks thing with chickens and I don't buy it, by 16 weeks ducks are JUST becoming sexually mature, surely ducks and chickens can't be all that different, and besides that, if there ARE 20, and not 18 chicks, and they all live (which again, i doubt, because I'm having quite a hawk and kestrel problem at the moment), right now they've busied themselves on the far side of the property with the young rabbits that are running there, but when they run out, I know where they'll look...anyway, I don't want to think about how many are boys!, all of the black chicks, (except one I think, which is SOLID black but i may be wrong), have yellow spots on their heads, a couple have very small ones that almost are barely visable, but most have quite large ones, I have read somewhere that a spot on the head can be linked to the sex?, big spots mean boys and little or no spot means girl?, or some such like that. if it does then that means ALOT of boys, and I'd have no idea what to do with them.

as far as them being friendly, I wouldn't mind if I could approach them some, without them freaking out, but at the same time, i quite like the idea of having chickens who mainly take care of and feed themselves with minimal help from me, thats the way my ducks are, they free range all day and only show their greedy lil faces at their shed during dinner time, in which they are locked up for bed. but I'm certainly not going to FORCE the chickens to be locked up, one day if they want to rent the ducks shed and be roomies, fine by me LOL.


but in all reality, what are the chances of a bunch of tiny chicks and their mother surviving out here?, the space under the duck shed is only about 10 inches, so i doubt that nothing much other than a mink could get under, but then again I've seen racoons shove themselves into some pretty tight spaces, and i know very much how sneaky those little boogers can be!

will let you all know what has come of my new squatters...I mean, cute and ungreatful lil guests , by morning!

ETA: that my property is 10 acres, looking to buy about 5 more that ajoins mine at the back, but is not family owned, in the next few months, so I certainly have room for a few more bird sheds if I so decided LOL

 

She has to be a survivalist if she survived incubating all those eggs for that long!

True to that!, what I still can't gather, though, is how the HILLZNICK she got to be here in the first place? like I said, the nearest person to me, to my knowledge, with chickens is 3 miles up the road, is it possible she traveled that far by herself?, no body I know who knew I was THINKING about chickens in the future would have brought them for me, and besides if they had, they'd have brought them TO me, just just dumped them! lol, I was thinking perhaps there was a possibility she herself was hatched wild around here with a flock long wiped out be predators? I dunno


as for the oats, I'll have to try it, my ducks eat anything they can fit into their mouths...or anything they can't, so I'll have to try once the ducks are out of reach, or they might mistake the chicks for furry, peeping oats.

ETA once again: that I had never seen, or heard any chickens since I moved here, so i'm thinking she must have come a long way from where she was sitting on her eggs, if she was close to the house to begin with, certainly I'd have seen or heard her?​