Mothers!

Wonderful things - Mothers! Either they're 'too much' and a chap never gets a rest or they're not around at all and then "what's to do?"

Take this bunch of Bantams (I often wish someone would): you can just see a little yellow chick.... and all the big birds around it - 4 or 5 of them - are its mothers! It took 5 of them 21 days and about 30 eggs to hatch just one little chick .... for the second time this summer.

Worse still, having hatched that one little chick they spent the next few days pretending they were going to hatch another (or others) so the poor little thing didn't get out into daylight for about 5 days! I kept having a look in their house to make sure it hadn't been squashed (as has been the fate with some of their other attempts) but it's clearly got a guardian Chickel looking out for it! Now that it is out it is chaperoned everywhere by all five hens. Daft or what?

Meanwhile, the bantam which hatched a couple of months back, under a similar scenario, is growing big and strong and has almost deserted its two mothers. This morning it was bold enough to climb through a gap under the fence and go out into the hedgerow all on its own...... returning somewhat reluctantly when the mothers set up a frantic warning chant of clucks..... beyond the hedge is the bridleway and there (often) be strangers so the mothers were probably justified in their concern..... but they do make a frightful racket. Enough to drive any enterprising young bird away from home!

Then down on the pond there's a poor little duckling whose mother has deserted it. But it seems not to be in the least perturbed. Alternates its time by swimming merrily around the pond or tucking itself into a quiet corner alone for a sleep. Doesn't appear to have any trouble from any of the grown ups - hens or ducks - and when night comes it waddles confidently into the hen house and finds a quiet place to go to sleep. In the morning it lines up with the rest of the ducks for the quick-march to the pond.

In contrast, there's the (only) other surviving duckling who is a real wimp and never leaves its mother's side: to the extent that, if she inadvertently waddles off out of the hen house in the morning assuming he is right behind her - and he isn't - he simply stands and emits the loudest and most plaintive squeaking I've ever heard from a bird - continuously until she gives up quacking for him outside and comes back in to fetch him.

And for the rest of the day he is never more than a few inches from her side - waking or sleeping.........

Then there's the other Buff Orpington which we moved - together with 16 eggs - to private quarters a few weeks back.

She promptly deserted half that number and over the following days kicked all but two out of the nest. And then proudly produced just one chick - which is now her pride and joy!

It's at this time of year that I realise why I don't produce eggs for commercial gain!

However, I do have very high hopes of the Little Corn Dolly. She's my favourite Bantam (not difficult) and the only one sensible enough not to cackle in terror whenever I open up their house in the morning. She's so called because she always greets me with an insistent demand for corn, which she then proceeds to peck at as if her life depended on it...... Anyway, she is currently sitting - Alone (a first for a bantam) - on a nest of about 6 eggs. We shall see what transpires.........