More Growing In The House

  Now the babies are in their cage and growing.

  You won't believe what I did. I had to visit my local feed store for the first time (this is a family owned one, not a chain).

  We had already tried a well known and advertised chain, but it has young people who don't give a care or know much employed there, and they don't have much that we want. As a matter of fact they were down right rude!

  So I was a more than a little timid to visit the REAL local feed and farm store place. I call it the REAL one because they are. The other one is not.

  The difference was night and day! They even had live chicks and other live baby poultry in there. oh how delightful! I felt like I had stepped back in time in there.

  I looked at the chicks and I was gone! These reminded me of chipmonks or baby partridge, the way the markings looked. I asked what kind they had there. They told me some were Ameraucana, and some were Speckled Sussex. I had seen the former online, but not the latter. So after I saw the Sussex chicken on the sign is a layer of brown eggs ( did I mention that my husband only wants to eat brown eggs???), I purchased two of each. Now we had twenty chicks instead of sixteen, lol! Yikes! Keep me out of that store!!!!

  The sign was up high and I couldn't see the picture well or read the print much either. I had in mind a speckled chicken that looks like what I now know is a Barred Rock chicken. But after I looked it up on the internet, I realized it isn't that kind of chicken.

  My pair of speckled sussex would grow up to be russet colored with white specks and black bars in their feathering. At first I was disappointed. But later I found them beautiful! I also looked them up on Henderson's chicken breed chart. I sure hope mine won't go broody and stay that way! Otherwise we may have to cull them. That would be sad... Oh that impulse buying emotion!

  When I got to the car with my four little chicks, I thrust the box into one of my son's hands. "Here, hold these." He looked at me and said, "You can't bring home more chicks, Dad will kill you! We already have sixteen!!!" I answered sweetly, "I already bought them. Shut up and hold them." I told my son, Jon, "I think I will add them into the cage if he isn't home, and then we'll see if your dad even notices." Jon didn't believe me that he wouldn't notice, at least for a while. lol!

  I was a little nervous adding chicks that were a week behind the other approximately. But later I found out that if we were going to easily add more, that I did add them soon enough before the others would be so territorial and protective.

  I scattered some feed on the bottom of the cage to get the first set of chicks distracted and busy. I then quietly added the other four chicks into their cage and waited to see how it went. There wasn't even any bickering or fussing. They all just continued hunting and pecking and the new chicks did too. But I hadn't realized how much the first chicks had grown already! Wow! It made these chicks look so small to me.

  I did notice that the four smaller ones helped each other and cuddled and huddled together more than with the other chicks for a bit. And they had to squeeze in to get their food but three had no issues about that. One was a little shy. It received extra prayer and encouragement. I made sure it got some food and water.

  I know you are curious about my husband's reaction when he came home from work, aren't you?

  When he came in, he went to visit the chick nursery. I held my breath and Jon waited in his room listening very hard, lol. I gave my husband some time to notice a that four chicks were different colored than the others. Notta... he didn't even notice. LOL!

  I couldn't stand it. I had to share... so I prodded him. "Do you notice anything different in there about the chicks?" He looked. He asked, "what am I supposed to notice?" I giggled. He probed me back, "What did you do?" I giggled some more. "Come on, just tell me." So then I gave him a hint. "Did you count the chicks to see if they are all there?" So then he started counting. He got it. I heard my first name being said in tone akin to when Fred Flintstone says, "W-I-L-M-A!" Only it was my name of course. Then my son came out and said, "I can't believe you were right, Mom, he didn't even notice." Then my husband was told the whole story. He was a little bit miffed over the extra number of chicks, okay? But he was trying to adjust and protest at the same time. I'd say he did pretty good at not absolutely killing me, but he did emphasize "No More. Don't buy ANY more. We already have too many!". No screaming or yelling after he had expressed himself saying my name emphatically. He did wonderful, I would say!

  And of course he asked and made sure they wouldn't lay any white eggs. (He thinks there is a taste difference. Lol. It's really the home raising that makes the taste difference though, according to the experts.) He was annoyed that 2 of the new chicks would lay colored eggs that wouldn't be brown. He says he won't eat THOSE eggs. they have to be brown to go into his mouth, lol. That's okay, I won't mind eating them! reminds me of the green eggs and ham story!


  Here are the new chicks, 2 Ameraucanas and 2 Speckled Sussex. The two breeds look so much alike at this stage. But one breed (the ameraucanas) has a yellow belly. All four of them run in the cage very quickly.

  One in particular runs everywhere and runs other chicks over and they reprimand it sometimes. It runs like a baby roadrunner! So cute, but so hard to catch! We ought to name it crash, because it crashes into the others, lol. But we will wait for to see what it is like later.

  I realized at this point of course, that I have chicken fever, and have it bad! I may not be able to go into that store without a guardian. I have noticed the chick stock, and breeds change often. So that means temptation EVERY time I go in there. Not good!