Tag: Adopted chicks

A Short Video of my Silkie & Two Hatch-a-Longs

It wasn’t easy finding chicks only a few days old at the end of November; most feed stores stop ordering until spring. I don’t know why, because we live in Phoenix, and now is when the weather is finally comfortable. A few places still had chicks, but they were already several weeks old and too big for a broody hen to raise. Eventually, I found two six-day-old Easter Egger chicks. Still, it felt risky to assume my hen would accept them since they were larger than what she was used to.
At dusk, I went into the brooder pen inside the coop, removed the fake eggs from beneath her, and tucked the two babies under her wings. I waited… and sure enough, she tightened her wings around them and made her soft little cooing noises to comfort them. Success! I checked on them once during the night, and it was clear my hen had once again accepted babies that just magically appear out of nowhere.

The hen and chicks will stay confined in the corner pen for another week or so. After that, I open the door and let Mama decide when it’s time to bring them out into the real world. She’ll protect them from the flock, she may be older, but she’s definitely the boss when she has babies. She won’t allow the existing flock anywhere near them, and they learn quickly to respect her.