EGG EMERGENCY

Continued from the previous post:  A HARROWING MORNING

It was a long afternoon teaching art in my studio, wondering whether that little chick was dead or alive out in Lucy's coop.

After my students left,  I took myself a deep breath and headed on out to see what had transpired.   This time I opened the nesting box door oh-so-carefully, holding my hand out to catch any projectile.

Lucy was on the nest.   All was quiet.

I gently slid my hand under her breast and she lifted herself up.
We both looked.

No egg.
No chick.

I peered into the nest box, looked around the coop.  --nothing.
I slid my hand through the bedding and the hay, but  couldn't find a hint of anything -- shell, feather, blood, anything.

Then while sifting around in the left corner I felt the egg.

It was cold.

I lifted it out,  picked the bedding off of it.  When it fell out of the coop that morning the side of the egg had smashed.  Looking closely I could see a bit of brown gooey chick inside.

I cupped my hand around the egg and blew warm coffee-breath on it.  The egg made a tiny peep.   I shut the door on Lucy, who had sat down and resumed her brooding as if nothing had happened,  and hurried to the house with the egg.

Thinking about Lucy, who Mother Nature had designed to be the perfect incubator,  I decided what the egg needed most was heat and humidity.

Immediately.

Here's all I could think of doing, immediately.

A spray-bottle and a damp paper towel prevented the lightbulb from cooking our little smashed egg.

Very very slowly, things began to happen.






I wanted so much to help the chick, but had read that it's very important to let the chick hatch on its own.


So I watched, sipping chardonnay and eating potato salad.

The hatching took hours.

 The chick struggled, napped, struggled some more.

I felt so fortunate to be able to witness this event.

I felt so happy for Lucy that she'd been successful in her brooding... well, until this last day.
I had to return the chick to her, and hoped that she'd welcome it back.

My family and I took only a few moments to adore the chick before I cupped it again in my hands and carried it out into the dark.

When I opened her door, Lucy said, Budup?
Hearing her, the chick peeped frantically and tottered off of my hand onto the nest.  Lucy lifted herself slightly and looked down as the chick dived for the warmth of her fluff.  I closed her door and waited a moment to listen as hen and chick shifted around in the dark.
The Budups continued, the peeping continued.
The peeps got louder.
The peeping sounded hysterical.
The Budups got frantic.
I opened the door and lifted Lucy to see what was wrong.
The baby had cuddled into the crook of Lucy's knee.  As Lucy folded her leg and sat, she was actually choking it.   When Lucy stood up, the chick was freed and it scooted around to find a safer location under its hulking mother. Lucy settled down again. I closed the door, sighed, listened a bit.
The muffled peeping quieted down and stopped while Lucy's soft chant continued.

She and her little one had worked hard for this moment.

I walked away.

 . . . . . . . . Next blog entry:  GOOD MORNING

A HARROWING MORNING

....continued from previous post: BUDUP
 
Though Lucy was getting a little tired of Hatsy's obsessive curiosity,

she graciously tolerated my own annoyingly frequent attention.


When I wasn't out snooping around her coop I was snooping around the internet reading up on any and all chick-hatching topics.
I read that the chick actually starts peeping inside the shell a couple days before hatching. So of course out I went, into the night.   I reached under Lucy, found the warm egg and put it to my ear.  
Nothing.  

The next night I read that if you tap on the shell it will tap back.  
So out I went again,  to sit in the dark under an umbrella in the rain with an egg to my ear.


I tapped.


I heard it -- a little tap-tapping inside.  I tapped again.  Chick tapped again.
Morse code?


Gave me shivers.  I gave Lucy her egg back and pranced home smiling.


Bright and early the next morning:

pip!



Chicken-folk call that first little hole  a pip.


This was it - this was the day.  Lucy showed no excitement, just the placid determination she'd exhibited from the start.    
I left Lucy and the egg for an hour or so, then returned.  
Nothing new. 


An hour later, I went out to check.
Nothing new. 
Hm. 
I guess fluffy little chicks don't just pop out of eggs like they do in cartoons.
I gave it another hour.


My  art students would be coming soon for one of my summer studio classes, so I headed out to check on the egg one last time.
I carefully opened the nest box door, and 


the egg rolled out, fell about two feet onto the hard ground, and cracked.


Inside the egg, our baby screamed.


I picked it up. Cupped my hands around the cracked shell. Broke into a sweat.     
I heard laughter and  looked up to see four little art students marching toward me across the sunny lawn.  
I had to act fast.


Lucy was agitated, I was shaking, the egg was screaming, I placed it back in the middle of the nest, shut the door, wiped my brow, and rushed to my students. 
  
"did the egg hatch yet?"   
"nope, not yet--  let's go do art! "


I tried not to faint as I herded them away from the coop and into the house.


. . . . . . . . . . Next blog entry:  EGG EMERGENCY

BUDUP

...continued from the previous post, BROODY LUCY

 Lucy continued to sit faithfully on her eggs and chant, 'budup".    While I'd read that a broody hen hops off the nest once or twice a day to get some food and to stretch her legs, Lucy wasn't able to get up.  The lack of movement weakened her twisted toes, and she just couldn't lift herself.  So a couple of times a day I helped Lucy off the nest.  I'd hold her for a bit until her legs stretched out and she could stand on her own.

She'd gulp down her food and guzzle some water, then she'd expel the most revolting poop, and then hobble about for a little while pecking at grass and enjoying her brief time outdoors. 
This was the moment Hatsy waited for.

 She'd make a beeline for the open door of Lucy's coop.  

She'd step gingerly inside and  utter a few sweet words to the precious eggs.

Then she'd scoot them around a bit with her beak and try to sit on them.  
She tried, but never did master the art of egg-sitting.

  One of the eggs would inevitably pop out from under her.

When Lucy returned to her nest, all it took was a look from Lucy to get Auntie Hatsy off the eggs.

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  

Although  we knew that only one of those eggs was fertile, I didn't want to cause Lucy any distress by removing the infertile one. I saw no harm in leaving it in the nest...

....until one night while cruising the chicken-websites, I read that a bad egg left in the nest could actually explode.  I grabbed a flashlight and scurried right out to Lucy's coop and removed the festering time bomb. 

She never missed it. I guess chickens can't count.

Lucy sat and sat - chanting  budup - budup - budup - day in and day out. 

Lil'White was only mildly interested in Lucy's business, while Hatsy's curiosity verged on obsession. 

At times Lucy appeared a bit annoyed with her little red friend.

  

.  .  .  .  .  .coming next:  A HARROWING MORNING

Broody Lucy

Trish unlatched the door to her henhouse and I followed her inside.  There were two lovely hens sitting in the nesting boxes.  Trish reached under the fluffy Rhode Island Red and pulled out two warm brown eggs.  The hen didn't really seem to notice.  Trish handed me the eggs and I slipped them into my coat pocket and then hurried home.

The eggs were still plenty warm when I presented them to Lucy.

  

With a calm matter-of-factness, she lifted herself slightly and then gently guided the eggs with her beak to just the right spot underneath her. Then she sat down. 

That was it. No 'thank you', no nothing.  

But that was okay.

The next day I let Lucy stay on the nest rather than booting her out onto the sunny lawn with the girls.   Hatsy and Lil'White sensed that something was up, and they curiously milled about Lucy's coop.

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Candling:

After seven days you're supposed to be able to see the beginnings of a chick in the egg by shining a flashlight behind it.    

Of course I couldn't wait seven days...  So on the fifth night Sarah and I went out and collected our precious eggs from under Lucy and brought them inside. We had to act swiftly, so as not to let the eggs cool too much.  We sat on the basement steps in total darkness fumbling with flashlights and eggs. 

One egg was definitely not happening.  

But in the other egg was very certainly a web of veins.  I used a pen to draw a mark on the fertile egg so we could tell them apart, then returned them both to Lucy's  little coop.  I tucked the eggs under her wonderful fluff.   Budup   budup   budup   --- what a nice sound out there in the dark warm night.

Thirteen days to go.

.  .  .  .  .  .  next entry:  BUDUP

  

Lucy: Gotta Have a Baby!

...continued from previous post: SCANNING THE SKIES

Lucy survived Marek's Disease and began to regain the use of her legs, although it took a lot out of her.  She remained very weak, and she slept a lot.  While she was living in the dog crate on the porch, we really enjoyed her company.  She was always up for a good chat on a summer evening.

But  when I put Lucy out with the girls, Lil'White continued to go after her like a crazed assassin.  

Since Lucy couldn't get far on those sad twisted feet, I fashioned her a little pen to keep her safe from vicious predators while she was out in the yard.

That pen turned out to be the best little invention. I made a couple more of them, which I could toss over the gals whenever I had to run inside to take a flaming pot off the stove.

Here Hatsy attempts to peck my eye out from the pen she's sharing with Lucy. 

I don't worry too much about foxes and coyotes because Marky is always in the yard and he diligently patrols the perimeter of his 1.3 acres. 

He loves his job.

He does not love the chickens.

But that's another story.

Lucy really missed living with the girls.   So when I built her little special-needs coop I made sure she had a view of the big coop, even from her nestbox.

  

 

Here's the mini-coop from the back.  Lots of doors so I could reach Lucy in case she needed me.

Lucy settled into her new digs okay.  

Hatsy liked to come over for visits, and sometimes she had a sleepover at Lucy's.

Now and then Lucy came back to our house for a little visit.

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .

Last summer, sometime in May, Lucy went broody.

She wanted a baby.

It was a hormonal thing.

It was unmistakable and it was fascinating.

She sat in the nestbox all day, except when I lifted her out and shut the door so she couldn't get back in.    She  was  all puffed up like a speckled balloon.  And she started chanting,  "budup     budup     budup     budup ..."    nonstop--  all day, all night. 

If we had a rooster, Lucy would have had a clutch of fertile eggs to sit on. But we had no rooster.   

budup.

Observing Lucy in her broodiness reminded me of how I felt when I was about 30 and suddenly really really really wanted to start a family.

So I called up my friend Trish, whose hens happen to have a lovely little rooster.

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  next blog entry:   BROODY LUCY

Scanning the Skies

...continued from previous post: Meet The Girls: Lil'White

Lil' White was dillydallying in the nesting box all morning, and Lucy and Hatsy seemed restless so I let them out of the coop for a moment to look for bits of corn and scratch in the snow.   As they stepped out into the world, they turned their tiny heads in unison and stopped dead in their tracks.  

I looked up, thinking there was a helicopter or something..

It was a  BALD EAGLE.  First one I've ever seen outside a zoo.

Would never imagine a bald eagle over Upton, MA.

Once the eagle was out of sight,  pecking resumed.

.  .  .  .  .  .  click here for next blog entry:   Lucy -- Gotta Have a Baby!

Meet the Girls: LIL' WHITE

...continued from previous post: Meet the Girls: HATSY

(spoken with a southern accent.)

She was an excruciatingly adorable chick.

    

She's named Lil' White because when her little tiny white wing feathers emerged we thought she was going to be a White Plymouth Rock.    I hadn't placed an order for one of these, but my order got all mixed up with my friend Trish's, so we really weren't sure who got what.

As Lil' White grew, so grew her cuteness.

   

Have you ever seen tailfeathers as cute as these?

In time, we realized she was not a White Rock--  she was a Buff Orpington.  Which was great because that's one of the breeds I had ordered.  I wanted three chickens, three different breeds.  Ones that would look nice wandering around the backyard... you know, lawn ornaments. 

Once we realized Lil' White wasn't a White Rock, her name had already stuck.  So that's why our yellow chicken is named Lil' White.  

Docile, seeming almost affectionate, is how the chicken catalogs describe Buff Orpingtons.  I ordered a Buff Orpington for this reason.  I also ordered a Buff Orpington because I wanted to say Buff Orpington on a daily basis.  Buff Orpington Buff Orpington Buff Orpington.

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  

Being unbearably adorable did have its drawbacks.

  

Lil'White was Sarah's favorite.  

She was also the favorite of every kid who came to visit.

Cuddled and adored, she had to put up with a heck of a lot of attention.

Lil' White grew up to become a beautiful bird.

Sometimes I wonder if her ravishing beauty has gone to her head.

Her golden plumage is a lovely complement to the phlox and the lilac.

Even rusty garden tools and peeling paint look good with Lil'White around

So who knew this sweet graceful chicken would one day flip out and try to kill Lucy....?

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  . Click here for the next entry:  Scanning the Skies