At the risk of being a little bit, just a little bit, tunnel visioned, i.e totally focused on the business of the newest additions to the family – the baby chicks, I thought an update might be in order. Young Henny One and Young Henny Two – (YHO and YHT respectively) who look almost identical, have both been sitting in the chicken shed for what seems like ages. YHO produced a few babies which she calculatedly neglected in order to hatch the main batch of chicks, (nature is quite clever and cruel) and allowed them to get eaten by the Retched Rooks, (RR’s). (See earlier posts).
All seemed to be going rather badly, having lost these little ones, then she hatched the rest and thereafter it has been CHAOS! Opening up the shed one morning, to my delight, YHO presents her babies, all six of them, all black (who will no doubt continue be indistinguishable when they are grown) and decides to take them out for a walk in the very long grass. This proves to be a bad idea because she then loses them. I have had to rescue one after another and tell her sternly to be more responsible but she takes no notice and doesn’t appear to hear me.
Then, just as I thought I had sorted them out, I go into the shack, deciding that a clean lot of straw should be put in, in honour of this achievement, I notice that YHT has disappeared. Creeping up to the nest, I see about six unhatched eggs. Oh dear! I look for her outside and finally find her under the honeysuckle bush having a dust bath with some of her newly hatched chicks! She eventually hatches a few more but……..
After a couple of weeks of all this activity, the net result is that all but one of the chicks have survived. Sad I know. Despite all my efforts, bringing in cold, lost souls into the airing cupboard, shewing off the Retched Rooks, generally trying to make these new Mums take care of their babies, it has all been to no avail.
The bright side is, that one little yellow chick still survives. Despite his Mum (YHT’s) neglect, he is still with us. It has been a delightful saga really. Not long after he hatched, Mum decided that she was fed up with sleeping on the floor and took up her usual position on the perch each night. The poor little fellow was left down on the ground. To my surprise, when I checked on him one night, I found he had managed to jump up into one of the empty nesting boxes and there he was, all alone nestled into the straw. Once the weather got cold, I took pity on him and brought him into the airing cupboard each night as he wouldn’t have lasted long if I hadn’t. Luckily, after a few days the speckled hen decided it was her turn to nest, so he cleverly tucked himself under her. I was a bit worried about this turn of events, fearing that Speckle might not like it, but magnanimously, she allowed him into her warm nest and there he has remained since.
Sadly his mother has all but given up the business of rearing him though to my surprise, he has ingratiated himself into the hearts of the rest of the group and even the Wretched Cockrills. They have taken to looking after him in an admirable way. One ‘darkie’ in particular has taken it upon himself to help feed him, he breaks up the corn I put out for them and then pecks the ground indicating that this morsel is for him.
Now he seems to belong to the group in general, they take him all over the garden throughout the day and bring him safely back each night. Even when the Retched Rooks try to grab him, they stand their ground and puff themselves up until they give up and fly away.
He has become a really special little chap who we have yet to name until we can be sure he will survive. Hopefully it won’t be long until he can fly up onto the perch at night and will be big enough not to appear as food for the Rooks. He’s a darling. Futher sad news is that really old Henny who had actually gone gray on top, fell off her perch stone dead the other day. I knew something was wrong as she had been staying in the shed on the perch largely by herself and not going outside at all. I noticed that one of the cockrils stayed on the perch close by her for the last few days of her life. It was sad. He seemed to know that she was dying and kept her company for several days until she died.
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