The New Chicks on the Block

Our chicks arrived in the mail today!

The postal service made a special trip to our house with this box, which was loudly peeping during the hand-off at our back door. Tiegan brought the scissors and we cut the tape, took off the lid, and found our four little birdies all healthy and active. And ready to get out. And so to their new digs:

The weird color in these photos is because of the heat lamp. These two-day old chicks will need their brooder at about 95 degrees or so this week. But before getting into all the nuts and bolts of the care, some introductions are in order:

This is Martha, the sleepy one. Her first order of business was to take a nap. If there's a runt of the flock, she's it. It's hard to tell in the photo, but her actual fluff is classic chick yellow, with no markings. We're pretty sure she's one of our easter eggers (which means she'll eventually lay blue or green eggs for us).

The one looking at the camera here is Abigail (our other easter egger), and this picture gives you a good sense of her personality. She's already clearly the boss of this group. Slightly bigger than the rest, she might be a mean girl — there wasn't any pecking until she started it. She also was the first to the food, leading the way for the others to give it a try. 

This is Sally, our Barred Rock. She's kind of quiet and perhaps not that bright. One of the first things she did was take a taste of poop as it was coming out of another chick's butt. When she gets big she will be black and white, not just black.

Last but not least we have Dolley. Dolley is also a yellow chick, but she has dark golden markings on her back. This one is a type of Star called a Golden Buff. Dolley was the first to drink on her own, and sometimes gets into some squabbles with Abigail.

The kids are so excited, and once we got them into the brooder we must have sat and watched the chicks for a solid hour, laughing at how funny and cute they are. The kids have spent plenty of time stroking their soft down and keeping track of who had eaten or taken a drink on her own. (They all have now, but you do have to kind of baptize them by dipping their beaks into the water dish so they can figure out how to drink.) Now all they do is eat and drink and step all over each other and poop.

And it is adorable.