Oh, about 21 days ago, we were all out in the barn visiting, and we discovered a hidden clutch of eggs that my girls had laid!!! Now, the problem with hidden eggs is that you don’t know how long there were there! So I guess most people either throw them out, or maybe scramble up for their dogs, that kind of thing. But our wonderful neighbors were down and said, “hey… let’s put them in our incubator and see what happens!”… Okay!!! We’re always game for something fun…

Chickens Happen!!! That’s what happens to hidden eggs! I like to think that the girls wanted us to find them and hatch them, to see that their lovely little babies make it to adulthood!!!

Well, a day ago, they started to hatch! First these two and then five more by the time they were all done. They are so precious and cute. Little! Oh my gosh, I kind of forgot how little they are when they first hatch! Our homegrown chicks are HUGE now… and even the little meat chicks are bruisers for sure…

One of them didn’t make it through the whole ordeal, he hatched but was very very frail and then finally just quietly passed away. Tough to deal with but at least he did hatch and tried hard to make a go of it all.

They have 6 little peeps now!!! We have made the trip down there to see them a couple times now… (haha yeah about 1/3 of a mile!) They are all nice and lively and bright, just the cutest little things!

I was telling the girls on a trip down… isn’t it just such a cool thing… that here we are on our third month anniversary at the farm and already we are breeding our own little half breed chicks, not once but twice! From our lovely ladies and our fancy daddy Bucka Roo… Who would have known that when I saved Bucka and his two French blue copper maran ladies from the Chinese restaurant guy (and most likely a chop dish) that he would go on to be an internet star and pass his genes down to not one but two groups of babies in such a short time! How cool!

They have a nice incubator from Tractor Supply… and have graciously offered us the use of it… I think I will go and get the egg turner that fits it and then we can all use it… it’s a lot easier to have the little machine turn the eggs for you, I’ll bet. And then I’m going to start collecting all the super dark Maran eggs we are getting and some of the Ameraucana eggs as well… why not! We can always share the chicks back and forth and also sell them. They will be fancy half breeds and some full breeds! Should be interesting to see how they turn out when they get to be full grown!