Say hello to...

What a lovely surprise this morning! Not one, not two, not even three, we have four...possibly five baby chicks from our six araucuna eggs!

Aren't they lovely! Not your traditional yellow easter egg chicks, but this divine grey/blue which is the colour they will become when they grow.

The peep-peeping from under mummy alerted me yesterday to the fact that we must have had one hatchling, but imagine the surprise when I popped my head around the door this morning to see these little ones.

We have to ensure now that they have plenty of chick crumb and fresh water and grit (without shell) for the next few weeks and hopefully mummy will live up to her current reputation and teach them to peck and drink. We are cobbling together a temporary home in the playshed using an old outdoor guinea pig cage/run so they can get a bit of sunshine once they're a little bigger. For now they'll live in the shed with mum. Eventually they'll graduate into a kindergarten that will be within the big girl coop, so they can be seen by the others but not actually touched and then finally when we think they're ready, they'll go in with the other birds. 

It's really felt like summer this weekend. We've put our hanging baskets out and decorated the new deck a bit...now, in true British spirit, let's watch it rain ;-) 

And finally, I noticed this yesterday. Is this a bleeding heart? I think it might be. In which case this is the one and only from the seeds I grew last year! If it is then it has an immensely tragic name for such a beautiful flower with it's hanging bells,  if it isn't...it's still really pretty