Silkie Chicken Drama and Hat

A chick can live for 3 days after hatching without eating or drinking - it is still absorbing (interanlly) the last of its egg sack. But by day 3 the chick is getting very stressed. Our dark Brahma setting hen hatched a silkie banty out 3 days ago and 3 other chicks out yesterday/this morning. She is still sitting on eggs and so far shows no sign of leaving the nest. If she figures the chick is in distress she may very well abandon the eggs in order to teach the chick to eat/drink. That is what the other two hens did. So I took the silkie chick away and introduced it to the Silkie momma who moved inside because she was getting beat up. It took a few hours, but the hen finally bonded with the chick and the chick the hen. I made sure it got a good drink of water and she taught it to eat.

It isn't completely out of the woods, but things are much better than this morning. Look at the size difference!

And I'm knitting a very quick Chinchilla chemo hat . I know the person who needs it may not like the fuzzieness, but it is very soft and light which ought to be great for summer in Texas. Here it is as a work in progress being modeled with a chick

It is hard to tell which one is softer - one is certainly less wiggly than the other!