New Chicks!

I completely forgot to post about the chicks we hatched out the other day! 

These hatched out the Monday last week (17th). A mixture of eggs we got from an extremely lovely couple from Abergavenny who keep and show many breeds of chickens.

I've been on for keeping Indian Game hens for a long time now and so when he offered us some eggs I jumped at the chance. We had a great morning looking round his birds, I took the girls with me and they loved it. He even gave us two bantams - the one is laying like crazy and we're loving the tiny white eggs!

He also gave us enough other eggs to fill the incubator with the 12 Indian game eggs.

We didn't have a great percentage in the end but it is my first time using it. Out of the 30 eggs we put in there we ended up with 13 chicks. We had a few bantam hatch on day 20 and the rest come over the following 24 hours.

I'm not sure who was more excited by it all, the kids or me! Also my wife plays it cool about not being into the chickens but I found her lay on the floor looking at the incubator more than a few times over those couple of days!

I've been shocked by how little these chicks are eating compared to the Ross Cobb birds. The first few days they weren't even interested in it. they've not grown much really I can see it'll be a slower grown bird, but that is what I'm after.

I'm looking forward to finding some more Indian Game eggs and hatching out another batch so I can keep non related trios and a few other breeds that take my fancy.

The incubator is now at a friends house and has duck eggs in. Some muscovy eggs for me and he is going to add some runner eggs on day 7 so they all hatch at the same time. Not had ducklings since I was a child when we used to keep a few on the farm. For the ducks I'm planning on fencing a big area near the polytunnel that I can then let the ducks into different areas - hopefully they might help with my slug problem!

Anyone else hatching out birds yet this year?