Chick Drama Continued

I am very sorry. I left you in suspense all weekend, and a long weekend, at that. I hope you did not lose any sleep, wondering if that little chick ever made it out of its shell.

Well, I couldn't do it. I couldn't leave that chick alone in its struggle to break out. I imagined it could feel the shell pressed so close around getting colder by the minute as its chirps went unanswered, despair rising in its little heart. I had to do something. And I remembered what they did in the days before incubators; so I grabbed a box and a work lamp out of the shop, and transferred the nest to the box.

Several hours later, assisted by encouraging chirps and words from the family, we watched it kick free from the shell.

But that is hardly the conclusion to our story.

 

While we were waiting, I candled one of the other eggs that Isadora had left in the nest. There was no sign of life in that egg, so I wasn't sure if any of the other eggs (that had thicker, colored shells and were difficult to candle) had any chicks inside. But at one point, as Chris and I were watching the hatch-out, I saw one of the two green eggs jiggle. "Did you see that?" I asked. He hadn't.

After the chick hatched, Joe was anxious to crack open the other eggs. The thought of cracking some open to find mostly developed chicks inside made my stomach turn. I handed him the egg I knew had nothing in it, and another I felt pretty confident was a dud, and told him to break them open somewhere I couldn't see. He came back, telling me there was nothing to report. I handed him two more eggs, and off he went. Nothing.

Now we were down to the two green eggs, one of which I felt had a chick inside. But I couldn't remember which one. Chris was ready to let Joe bust them open. "Are you sure I didn't bump the box and make it move?" he asked. Quite sure. Finally, I agreed to let Chris carefully break a hole in the eggs to see if anything was inside. He took a flat head screwdriver to the first one. A few taps, and some liquidy egg-white flowed out. Nothing there. He grabbed the second egg. I held my breath. He carefully poked a hole and, "There IS a chick in there!" No kidding. I knew I saw it move.

By this time, it was getting late. We moved the box and heat lamp into the spare room in the trailer, and left the chick with the unhatched egg, hoping we'd have two hatched out by morning. As Chris had knocked quite a hole in the egg, I was worried that it would dry out before the chick could hatch out, and the chick would get stuck inside. But I had also heard that if you help a chick out of its shell, its chances of survival are greatly reduced. Chris decided that if it wasn't hatched by morning, he would break it out before he left for work and see what happened.

Next morning, I awoke to find Chris getting ready for work. He reported that it hadn't hatched out, so he had broken open the shell. It was still alive. Great, I thought. He leaves me to deal with a dying chick. I transferred the chick to plastic bin inside the box so that the other chick (who was doing well) wouldn't trample or peck it to death before it could get on its feet.

By the end of the day, our little preemie was up and appeared to be fine.

But now, after raising two batches of chicks already this year, we had two more chicks on our hands. Neither Chris nor I was anxious to have to take care of a couple of chicks for another month. We especially weren't anxious to have to pay the extra electricity costs that a heat lamp generates. What were we going to do? Our only hope was that Isadora would take these two under her wing along with her other chicks.

The next day, Chris carried the two chicks out into the yard and set them down near Isadora. She didn't pay them any attention, and while her two chicks were sticking to her like glue, the new chicks looked helplessly lost. After a few minutes, Chris decided he'd better gather them back up and return them to the box and safety. As soon as he grabbed one, it started chirping. Isadora heard the chick in distress, flared up like a tom turkey, and charged at Chris. Isadora is not a big hen, but let me tell you, she's pretty intimidating. In order to get the other chick, Chris had to distract Isadora by 'threatening' her chicks while Finley grabbed the second late-hatcher.

We finally decided our best bet was to put Isadora and all the chicks into the little chicken tractor where the chicks would be safe and Isadora would be corralled. Hopefully, under these conditions, she would accept the chicks, and the chicks would have a good chance of learning that Isadora was their new 'heat lamp.' Catching Isadora proved to be a challenge, but once we got her cornered Chris was brave enough to grab her. Although her two chicks had taken cover under the stable, it didn't take them long to find their way back to where Isadora was locked up in the pen. Now all four chicks were in the pen with Is.

Thankfully, it was a warm day out, and the sun was enough to keep the chicks warm. When I checked on them later in the afternoon, Isadora was resting in the shade of a box I provided for them to hide in, her two chicks nestled against her. The other two were huddled together outside.

That worried me a little. If they weren't in with Isadora when night fell... But when I went to check on them after dark, all four chicks were hidden away somewhere in the warmth of Isadora's feathers.

The next morning found a happy family scratching and pecking in the grass.