life on the farm

This is the saga of the unexpected chicks.
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3 eggs are pipped! and I have to go to work! No fair!

Hopefully will have chicks when I get home. Hubby will be here to keep track of the proceedings. I'm going to hate not being here!

I'm so surprised ... I was really happy to see 1 egg pipped, then when I showed the kids, they pointed out 2 more I totally missed!


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Okay, I was really starting to panic when I read about the first-time mama hens not caring for their babies and letting them get cold and die ... hubby called and I immediately requested a chick update! LOL

He went out and checked, and there is a DRY FLUFFY brown chick under mama hen, and another chick hatching RIGHT NOW ... I am so wishing I was home instead of at work today! It's going to be a LONG day ... he has a bunch of stuff to do, and I'm requesting photos and phone calls every hour ... LOL I love my hubby!!



Brown chick ... is it possible that we got one RIRxRIR chick? I have two roos (RIR and dark silkie) and a bunch of different hens, but the only hen that was brown when she was little was my RIR.

Okay, I found my list, here's what I have:
8 Araucanas (EE)
4 Black Australorps
3 Buff Orpingtons
2 Rhode Island Reds (1 is a roo)
2 White Rocks
1 Barred Rock
1 Bantam Silkie (roo)

The chick came from a brown egg, not blue, so ... maybe?
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As of last update, we have a brown chick from one of the darker brown eggs, and a 'gold' chick from one of the lighter brown eggs. No news on other eggs cracking yet, he was going to leave the hen alone for a while and let her do her job, since she seems to be okay with sitting on wiggly eggs and wet chicks!

A few days ago:



Knowing what kind of hens I have, does anyone know what kind of egg each of those are? Except the blue one, of course!
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Now THREE chicks (a dark but still wet chick from the blue egg) and the fourth egg is cracked and starting!

If the two eggs that were laid 4/4 are the two that are left, they are sure going "by the book" here!
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They're real!!



Didn't investigate the other eggs yet, mama is finally to the point where she will peck! LOL She's been soooo good natured about all the fussing and moving so far. Waiting until the kids get home from school to check the other eggs and get a better look at the chicks.

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I was so jealous that hubby was here to see this and I was at work:



But then while my kids and I were waiting for a barely pipped egg to hatch, we peeked under mama and saw this:



The egg that had been just pipped only about an hour earlier, was already hatched out and a damp reddish-yellow chick was drying ... and the 5th egg was opening up with a little black chicklet inside!

Plus, the 6th and final egg was pipped.

Going out to check and see how 4, 5 and 6 are doing!
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Chick 1 -- reddish brown, dark brown egg: RIR x RIR ?
Chick 2 -- gold with black flecks, feather foot! light egg: Silkie x ?
Chick 3 -- brownish, blue egg: RIR x EE
Chick 4 -- light brownish, light egg: RIR x ?
Chick 5 -- black with buff chest, dark egg: RIR x Black Austr. ?
Chick 6 -- light color, light egg, struggling ??
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Chick #6 made it ... looks just like #2 ... tiny feathered legs!



All six made it through the first night too ... very amazed!



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Thanks everyone who responded ... I still can't believe all six hatched! It is amazing to watch them just totally figure out the eating and drinking on their own, and the ladies at work are lovin' the pics!

LOST is amazing

Season three is winding down. Five more episodes, a season four confirmed, and an "end in sight" as it were.

That said, it would be almost impossible to catch someone up to speed on LOST. You're either into it, or you're not. And I'm all in.

There is a pretty neat FREE download on iTunes of a LOST recap program intended to get new viewers up to speed, if you are so inclined. But it barely touches the surface. Diehard LOSTies have all of the DVDs and watch them over and over again for missed clues. They debate every tiny word or image in detail, looking for a deeper meaning. They have websites, fan pages, albums of screen caps, spoilers, interviews with producers and actors, and so much more.

I'm not quite a full-fledged LOSTie, yet. I tape every week so I can watch it a second time with my hubby, who is at work when LOST airs. I catch him up to speed on the 1% of the theories I've seen on one of the dozens of fan forums. We share our own theories, and point out details the other might have missed.

It is the only hour of television I watch every week. Period.

Have you heard the saying, trust half of what you see, and none of what you hear? That's pretty much how it goes on the island. There are so many plot twists, so many surprises, so many people not what they claim to be ... and apparently no one is innocent. We know some of our characters have done bad things—fraud, adultery, murder and maybe worse—and we assume that many others have as well. There are fan sites dedicated to how many people each character has killed, on island and off. There are sites dedicated to building a time line that some even consider flexible ... speak of time travel and distorted reality. I can't even begin to scratch the surface of the many theories of what is going on, where and even 'when' they are, how they got there and why they can't leave ... they are infinite.

It's late, and I'll have to save now and add another day ... would love to hear from some LOSTies out there.