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Most of them have been sold, with a couple of the best girls integrated into the flock. :) Unfortunately, one of them was injured somehow so that her leg splayed out, didn't recover, and had to be culled. :(

Could he be a Leghorn?

My March babies are in the integration pen. I've got one or two who aren't as well-feathered as I'd prefer, but they should be fine cuddled up in the deep straw I laid down.

Dominiques have lovely personalities. When I refocused my flock to have only one kind of brown layer the first family come to pick out some birds was homeschooling young kids so I grabbed my Dominique and told them "This is my friendliest hen." She's probably being spoiled rotten by those...

I have no idea what's going on gentically with those ones with so much white. It's a LOT more white than my normal Australorp chicks.

Not quite 10 days old and some of these are definitely boys!

One of the ways I keep my hands off nature's process is to schedule hatches for days that I know I'll be gone much of the day.

Hatch plenty then. :) Straight run? I can't sell straight run chicks worth anything, but I can sell POL pullets like mad. Younger pullets and mature hens in the middle.

How many do you think you can sell? Chicks are in demand this spring.

I'm wishing you the best of luck. My first assist, Slowpoke, turned out to be significantly deformed. The shrink-wrapped chick from last week, Saran, was hatched with a curled foot but it fixed itself overnight without need of a chick shoe so I think it was just from being so badly stuck.

This is where I find myself. I can let nature take it's course with one that's just pipped and not progressing, but if I hear a partially-zipped chick peeping wildly as it struggles without making progress I can't stand to hear the peeps getting weaker and weaker. :(

I had my water wells unexpectedly run dry a couple times during this hatch -- potentially contributing to poor Saran's shrinkwrap condition (though it didn't occur during the lockdown). I'd check the well in the morning before I left for work and find it dry when I got home!

The Southeast has had exceedingly variable weather this past month or so. I had a hard time keeping humidity steady because one day it would be open window weather and raining, the next day we'd have the heat running.

This is why the incubator is in the laundry room -- furthest point in the house from any of the bedrooms. ;) I have been leaving them for 2-3 days just in case, but haven't had one hatch past the end of day 22.

I forgot to say, Saran's curled foot is fine. I didn't have to use a chick shoe.

Some of my hatches have spread over 3 days.

It's so hard to see them on new hatchlings! Single combs are tiny rows of serrations -- most visible on the CW crosses. Previous hatches have had rose combs, which are little flat spots. I'm not sure about pea combs -- there are some chicks who don't seem to have a comb at all, which...

11 chicks, 2 Dominant White -- Australorp X California White 2 blues 3 blacks 3 splash and Saran, who is definitely Australorp x OE and *probably* blue but I'm not 100% sure. there are 2 more xOEs and an Australorp x FCM -- but I can't tell them apart yet. All chicks are clean-legged...

Popping around the incubator this morning. I'll take him out later this morning when I take the others out of the brooder for photography and formal counting. :) Alas, the one that pipped and didn't progress is DIS, I peeled away some shell to be certain and it seems to be one of those mystery...

Time to meet Saran. I've always been a little vague on just what constituted a shrink-wrapped chick, but I do believe that this is definitely a case of shrink-wrapping. He/she made absolutely no progress in several hours so I took the egg out to see if there was more dry membrane and was there...