Hatch Count: Seven healthy chicks in a variety of cool, fluffy colors. (They are all silkies).
One has a splayed leg. I'm 99% this was caused by its membrane drying after it had freed one leg and its rear end, which caused it to flail around a lot. It can walk, run, eat, and drink despite the leg so it is getting short bursts of spraddle leg treatment (tying the legs together with self-adhesive gauze).
(Eight chicks actually hatched, but one of these may have been hatched/heavily assisted by Baby Splay Leg (I have video of chicks pecking industriously at other chicks' shells, and Baby Splay was the only chick in the incubator at the time). Anyway, this chick had serious deformities and would not eat. After two days of intensive care in a clean incubator at my house, we humanely euthanized it.)
I want to keep ALL THE CHICKENS, which means I need to get Mickey and Minnie (last year's hatch) adopted. Or maintain them in two separate homes. Or get insanely, miraculously lucky and have had an all-hen hatch this year. Mickey and Minnie are socialized. Minnie lays more eggs than the average silkie and Mickey is a show-quality rooster, so I figure I may be able to entice someone to adopt them.
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