17th December 2017
Gertie and Maude
After the very sad passing of 'Starry', I wondered how my little flock would sustain itself as Starry was my only broody hen. So it was a lovely surprise when her sister 'Lucky' went broody and successfully hatched two little chicks.
For the first time ever, I even had a contingency plan that would avoid us having to butcher any potential roosters, as my friend was looking for a replacement rooster. Ironically both chicks turned out to be girls. Being able to raise the two sisters together meant I was able to return Lucky to the rest of the flock fairly early on in the piece and raise the little chicks together - it is always hard if there is just one chick as you have to keep them with Mum or their introduction to the flock is just too savage.
Our neighbour Teza had always wanted chickens but never quite got there, so we let her name these two.
'Gertie' and 'Maude' are lovely girls and easy to distinguish from the others as Gertie has extra long wattles and Maude has white ears!