And now for something completely unrelated to baby: About those chicks...

I can't remember if I wrote about them or not, but way back when, like maybe early October, I ended up with this:

 Which unfortunately broke my iron clad agreement with my husband about no more animals for a while. This may have been before or after I went out and brought home a new cat. (I must stress, Tooleo is a barn cat like 75% of the time, and he only gets to come into the mud porch, so he's not technically a pet but a hard working farm animal - he even caught a field mouse tonight). It didn't help that the only place for them to live was in an aquarium. On my kitchen table. Cause that's the most sensible place to keep live poultry. Especially with a baby in the house. Then the noisy little buggers moved upstairs. And they were noisy.

You may or may not be able to tell, but that's Binx in the lower left hand corner, having a nervous break down about the chicks in her house. Did I mention this dog is slightly neurotic? Then they outgrew that container, and graduated to full on rubbermaid container, filled with  paper pellets from the dear departed rabbit:

 Birds of a feather

Flock together.

So yes. Nugget and Frenchy were very cute. They're slightly less cute now that they're not so fuzzy, but they're both still very sweet chickens. They actually enjoy being picked up and petted, and seem to have slightly more sense in them than the others. Way more personality. They now live with the other chickens, in their temporary coop. Which may or may not be located in the garage for the winter. Just this winter though. Swears.

Now! What did we learn?

• Clear out the eggs from under your broody hens. Yes they peck you when you do it, but you'll regret it if you don't. You don't have to do it every day, but you probably should do it more often than once a month. Just a suggestion.
• Two chicks can be raised from eggs. It's a lot of work and possibly not worth it for just two, but at least you'll find out that it can indeed be done. 
• Everyone will think you're crazy. This will not come as a surprise to anyone, just a confirmation of the fact. It does however, get annoying when they keep repeating it out loud.
• If the eggs under the broody hens just disappear all on their own, don't kid yourself. They hatched and something got them. That's life, deal with it.
• When introducing new chickens to an existing flock, the roosters will definitely pick on the most different looking young chicken. Probably pull all her tail feathers out. It's very mean and bloody and horrible, and you really will need to protect her and keep her away from the rest. 
• Chickens can survive having their tail feathers pulled out. They need a lot of cuddles and tlc to get over it. It's sad, but made much more doable if the chicken likes cuddles.
• Don't keep two roosters just because you're attached to them. You're an idiot. They'll take turns picking on the runty chicken to show off to one another. Also, they're noisy.
• Roosters should be stewed and not heard. If not, you end up with chicks living in an aquarium in your kitchen. This is not an advisable situation.

In closing: I have now successfully hand raised chicks that were incubated by a broody hen. Kids, don't try this at home unless you have a lot of time on your hands, or a commercial poultry operation. Who am I kidding, those people don't even do it themselves, they outsource their chicks till they get their feathers.