I heard that telltale chirping coming from the coop this morning. When I was sure of who’s wing it was coming from, I let things be and kept checking in. Two hours later, the chirper was unattended on a lower tier so I brought him inside.
I did mention that this all happened just the same yesterday as well, right? Well, it did. So rather than brood a single bird, my partner went to Tractor Supply and purchased four brethern yesterday afternoon. So this morning as I’m scooping up a cute little chirping chick, I see what looks like an egg that something happened to before it was done. Then I noticed that it was breathing, even though it looked kinda like a transporter accident on the half shell, and didn’t seem to be enjoying the morning all that much.
Turning him over though, he wasn’t nearly as scrambled as he looked at first glance. The navel seemed worryingly unfinished in terms of ‘wound’ size relative to his belly. (Oh yeah, today I learned that belly buttons are not, in fact, exclusive to mammals.) But four hours later he looked just fine, and tonight I can still pick him out of the crowd, but it took me a moment.
ETA: Just checked on them the next morning. They all seem perfectly chickly, and the new guy’s feathers look mostly normal, only about one third hair-like. Simply amazing considering what I thought was gonna have to happen 24 hours ago.
