Our Home Grown Chicks

Omelet

Last Thursday was open house and we had timed our incubating eggs just perfectly. They began hatching during class that day. We watched the first little girl emerge from her egg all wet and tired. We left her in the incubator to dry and when we returned for open house at 5, she had 3 friends. The next morning there were 7. We moved the dry chicks to a cage with a heat lamp, food, and water. By the time I took them home on Friday to babysit for the weekend, we had 11. They are so cute! My children named every last one- the yellow one above is named Omelet. We shared our chicks with the rest of the school- everyone had a chance to admire their cuteness- and then I took them back to J&S West today. Boo Hoo! What a great lesson!

The first chick to hatch

Incubating Eggs

Now that our butterflies have emerged from their chrysalides, we have begun a new adventure. We are learning to care for eggs and the chicks that hatch from them. We had a guest teacher give us a lesson on how to act as surrogate mother to our 18 eggs. Thank you, Heather. The eggs need to be kept warm (100°) for 21 days. We have an incubator. At that time, they will begin to crack their shell using a special tooth on their beak called an egg tooth. When they fight their way out the chicks' feathers will be wet. We will move them to a cage with a heat lamp, food, and water. Their feathers will dry quickly and we will have cute fluffy chicks! We can't wait!

Playing with chicks and ducklings