Tag Archives: Ixworth chickens

Chicks and Chickens

Posted on April 6, 2012 | 1 comment

The chicks are two weeks old. They are developing beautifully; their wing feathers are now complemented by emerging tail feathers. Admittedly they’re also looking a bit scruffy, as they’re shedding their fluff to make way for the feathers.


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Another hen is laying – at last!

Posted on March 30, 2012 | Leave a comment

We’d almost given up on middle and junior hen. Only senior hen has been laying, a steady four eggs a week. But this afternoon, the nestbox contained two eggs, and a quick look showed that junior hen has started egg production.

It’s a small start, literally. Senior hen’s egg, on the right, weighs 63 grams, which is fairly typical. Junior’s first egg of 2012 is a modest 44 grams, and is a rather elongated shape.

Still, maybe we’re on course to incubate some successfully. The duck eggs will be finished in 3 weeks’ time, so we’re planning another hatch beginning late April.

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The chicks are a week old

Posted on March 29, 2012 | Leave a comment

Well, one of them is. Most will be one week old tomorrow. Here they are on Monday, when most were 3 days old. They’re still at the “bundle of fluff” stage, but growing rapidly. We’ve progressed from food and water in a saucer to a proper chick feeder and drinker.


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Picture post: hatching eggs

Posted on March 24, 2012 | 1 comment

I’ll start with a sentimental picture of adorable fluffy chicks, so that everyone can say, “Aaaaah”.

But the point of this post is simply to show eggs as they hatch. I managed to record all of the final four of our hatching eggs. Two on Friday lunchtime, one late afternoon, and the final one on Saturday morning at about 8am.
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Hatch!

Posted on March 23, 2012 | Leave a comment

It’s been three long weeks since we put the eggs in the incubator to hatch, and two weeks since we candled them for fertility, which brought the numbers down from 17 to 8.

I haven’t messed with them since then, and just let the incubator do its work. Every hour the eggs were turned, to the accompaniment of a little happy egg turning tune. Then on Tuesday evening, the incubator switched into hatching mode. The egg turning mechanism switched itself off, the temperature dropped half a degree, and the humidity rose to 60% to emulate the conditions for hatching under the broody hen. Friday (today at the time of writing).

Thursday evening, a day ahead of schedule, this little chap was born.


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Incubation 8 days in

Posted on March 11, 2012 | Leave a comment

Well, we candled our eggs after 8 days. I suppose that it depends whether you’re a glass-half-full or a glass-half-empty sort of person as to whether the results were good or poor. Of our 17 eggs, 8 are developing normally.


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Catching up with the chickens

Posted on February 29, 2012 | Leave a comment

I’m afraid that I’ve rather neglected the blog in recent weeks, so this is something of a catch-up. The snow and very cold nights inhibited the other two hens from coming into lay, so we still only have senior hen laying at a steady rate of two eggs every three days. The much milder weather that followed the wintry spell hasn’t yet persuaded either of the others to start again, although all three are the object of much attention from the cockerel.


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The first egg of 2012

Posted on January 22, 2012 | 1 comment

Well, it’s finally happened. The chickens are coming back into lay, and on Saturday, we got an egg.

The first egg of 2012 in the nestbox


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Chicken Project 2 launches

Posted on January 9, 2012 | 1 comment

And so, the new year being a time for firm resolve, Chicken Project 2 is under way. We’ve been extremely pleased with our Flyte so Fancy house and run, and we’ll need another one alongside the first.

Here’s the site:

Looking from the south at the empty bed that the new run will occupy


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We went to the Fed

Posted on December 30, 2011 | Leave a comment

aka the National Federation of Poultry Clubs Championship Show. I know that we’d only recently been to the National Show, but we were keen to further our knowledge, and the Fed is if anything even larger than the National.

And another jolly nice day it was. It was very similar to the National, about which I’ve recently written, so this entry is more of a story in pictures …

The entrance to the show, not yet busy as we arrived


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