Chicken Hatching Fun!

Our chicks began hatching Sunday afternoon! It has been so exciting! There are 11 hatched so far, out of 20 eggs total (a few I think were duds - but because this is my first time I left them in there, checking regularly that they weren't smelling funky and rotting, just in case I wasn't seeing what I thought I was seeing when I candled them).

A Rhode Island Red rooster breeding with White Plymouth Rock hens is called a Red Sex Link. The cockerels should be yellow-er in color when hatched, and the females may vary more, but should all be more red than anything else. So far, I know which ones are which. The full RIRs are the ones with the darker stripes down the back - that is what all the RIR chicks looked like that we got last year. Can you see which ones are which in the picture? Hint: There is only one full RIR so far (in this picture) and one cross cockerel.

Here are two more that have only recently hatched.

I have a feeling only 1 of the remaining eggs in the incubator might possibly hatch now. It has pipped, and I've heard it chirp a few times, but it still hasn't emerged. The others I haven't even seen rock, let alone pip. They may all be duds.

*Soon to come - picture of the 11 chicks currently in the brooder, just as soon as the Little Man wakes from his nap. He's currently sharing space with them for a day or two while we build a door for the shed that will hold the brooder outside. Pictures will come of that soon too!