WhirldWorks Farm
A small homestead and Debouillet sheep farm in Central Texas
Independence Day Chicks!
We were gifted this Silky/ Cochin hen, as a six week old chick in 2017 (I think) by Rachel and James Cubas from the Cochin hen at their school; Marimont Montessori in Pflugerville TX. Liam went to school there, for about two years, before mamma retired to stay home and become fully dedicated to farming and being mamma. 
For various shall we say “predatory reasons” she is the only one left out of 9 that we originally had received. At the time we recieved the Silky/Cochin chicks we were having problems with an aggressive rooster (named Mr. Rogers,- oh the irony) so we gave several of the chicks to our neighbors. This was their first attempt at any kind of farm animals at their homestead (A Shaffer Homestead) and they built an incredible chicken coop and took great care of them.
After about 8 months one of them, that they had named, Bell became broody (when a hen won’t leave the nesting box to eat, or poo, or scratch, she wants to hatch chicks and she is called broody) and she raised up a brood of 10 chicks, hatched with minimal human assistance at my neighbors homestead.
That fall for “predatory reasons” they were down to a handful of chicks and grown Silky/Cochin hens and roos and then found that they need to be away for an extended period of time. So,.. they returned the rest of them back to our farm.
Right now we only have two left; Bell and Galadriel. Galadriel is one of the chicks that Bell raised two years ago.
So this spring Bell started getting Broody again and after a few weeks of forcibly removing eggs from under her and taking time to (hopefully) fill in all of the gaps in our brooder coop, we were convinced that she was serious about hatching some more eggs and we put her in the nesting box, with hay.
We started giving her all of the eggs we collected each day for almost a week…
…and then they all fell down and broke:(
So we added a little lip to the nesting box
,…and started once again to give her all of the eggs we collected each day for one week
and then let her be…
The way that she spreads her wings out over all of the eggs to keep them warm reminds me of Psalm 91:4 “And under His wings you may seek refuge;” and of how God cares for those who seek refuge in Him.Gods love and care for us is reflected in every aspect of nature and the life that He has created ans we miss so much of that in our “civilized” and “technologically advanced” society, sighs…
but back to Bell;)
Over the nest almost three weeks we brought her bits of fruit and and vegetables, since she didn’t seem to be getting up to feed herself as far as we could tell,
and we began counting the days!! 🙂
We expected to start seeing chicks hatch by the 24th
but the 24th came and went, and no chicks
and the 25th, no chicks,
the 26,… still no chicks, maybe it was too cool, or maybe the eggs weren’t fertilized…
the 27th we – didn’t – even – check-
But on Sunday hurray our first chick hatched. It is sooo cute.The little peeps and so tiny and fluffy!
We did a little research and apparently it is important to get the chicks drinking water so we are working out how exactly to do that, in this little nesting box. Maybe next time we will be more prepared. For now we are just refilling a tiny cup of water, as needed.
There are TEN more eggs in there and we could hear more than one little chick peeping this morning when we did our “well check”.
Also a few of the eggs we bobbing around a bit, so we expect to see more tiny babies very soon!
It is so exciting to have baby animals around at different seasons of the year.
We may have to figure out a way to have some fall babies of some kind this year, lol!!!
WhirldWorks Farm 
Would you believe that old Cochin hen (Rosalind) is still around and kicking? 😉 She’s between 10-12 years old now, I think. We just hatched her grandbabies last week–they’re our winter storm brood. The father is the most beautiful iridescent and gold rooster named BB King–and he is undeniably her son since he’s so goshdurn feisty. Glad to hear her line is continuing on your farm, too 🙂