Poor old Sid ( Big Bertha or Sid Vicious depending on her hormone levels ie:- whether she was just one of the girls, or full on broody.)

Of the 4 chooks that are sitting on eggs, Sid had been broody the longest and hers were the first to hatch. Towards the end it all got too much for her though and she died on the nest, smothering 4 of her young uns.

I suspect she couldn’t decide when to leave the nest and became too weak for lack of food. It’s a bit hard to know really as she was feisty enough the day before and you never messed with Sid when she was broody – she would draw blood and hang on for grim death. We were interested to see how she’d take to motherhood too, being such a fiesty protective broody but alas, that’s not too be.

When she collapsed on the nest she smothered those 4 but there were 6 in total, so that meant 2 lucky survivors. One of those had only just hatched while the other was a little on the squished side.
Those battered, but lucky, 2 I briefly placed under one of the other mums (South mum) that had a couple? of chicks already – briefly because I had second thoughts about that newest hatching fearing it may not survive there.
Instead I placed that one, with Sid’s remaining eggs , in Igor’s incubator I’d at least had the foresight to fire that up a couple of days previously, so it was right to go.

Later that day… another of Sid’s eggs hatched making 2 wet furry balls in Igor’s incubator, just waiting to strengthen up and be re-homed.

Next day, Those 2 were re-homed under the South mum after she left her nest with 6! of her own. Her remaining eggs were placed into the incubator.

Next day plus 1, (3 days after Sid’s demise)
The third mum has hatched one chick and has hopped off the nest to look after it (the complete opposite of Sid’s instincts). Those eggs are now in the incubator and one has hatched already (it was pipping when I recovered them.) To top it off, one of Sid’s eggs started pipping soon after and has also hatched so that means 4 survive her.

Total to date, 12 chicks…
South Mum – 9 chicks (3 of which were Sid’s) – Turns out that she had a small flock under her already!
Middle Mum – 1 chick (with 2 new incubator hatchings – 1 of hers and 1 of Sid’s – to be placed under her tomorrow night. All going well of course)
Sid – 4 dead, and 4 surviving as above.
North mum – Still sitting. No hatchings yet.

We expect, or rather, hope to get a few more hatchings from the incubator. There are 20 eggs in there, and about 8 eggs still under the North Mum. Of those in the incubator at least 15 candle as okay, the others are probably too fresh – rather than infertile.

And this Virginia is why you don’t count your chickens before they are hatched!

Fingers crossed for a few more to come through though. :-)