buttersbrood
Chirping
Hi there!
We have a lovely little bantam, who has sat on 6 fertile (mailed) eggs for 23 days now. They are 3 Barnevelder and 3 Araucana eggs. We almost gave up on the eggs, as only one of the Barnevelders looked viable, and we found it hard to candle the Araucanas.
So we bought 5 chicks to put under our hen, just so at least shr had some chicks! Day 23 has just started, and we intended to put the bought chicks (3 day today) under her tonight. However, when we candled one of the eggs, just to make sure all are definitely not going to hatch, one of the Barnevelders chirped! (the one we thought might be viable) We could clearly see its beak in the airsack too.
We are overjoyed. Also confused! So we left all eggs under mum, didn't touch any of the others as we don't want to disturb them, in case there's more live ones.
We now have one or more chicks hatching probably tomorrow, plus our 5 3/4 day old bought chicks.....
My question is: can we still put the older, bought chicks (currently under a heatlamp) under the hen, once the eggs have hatched? Can you mix day old and 4 day old chicks? And will the hen accept the older chicks?
What a mess!
We have a lovely little bantam, who has sat on 6 fertile (mailed) eggs for 23 days now. They are 3 Barnevelder and 3 Araucana eggs. We almost gave up on the eggs, as only one of the Barnevelders looked viable, and we found it hard to candle the Araucanas.
So we bought 5 chicks to put under our hen, just so at least shr had some chicks! Day 23 has just started, and we intended to put the bought chicks (3 day today) under her tonight. However, when we candled one of the eggs, just to make sure all are definitely not going to hatch, one of the Barnevelders chirped! (the one we thought might be viable) We could clearly see its beak in the airsack too.
We are overjoyed. Also confused! So we left all eggs under mum, didn't touch any of the others as we don't want to disturb them, in case there's more live ones.
We now have one or more chicks hatching probably tomorrow, plus our 5 3/4 day old bought chicks.....
My question is: can we still put the older, bought chicks (currently under a heatlamp) under the hen, once the eggs have hatched? Can you mix day old and 4 day old chicks? And will the hen accept the older chicks?
What a mess!