back in the saddle

 Our last hatch ended rather unsuccessfully with the brutal slaying of all of our chicks on the back porch.   We were all traumatized by the loss of our chicks, but knew we'd hatch again. 

Our past few trips to the farm had gotten cancelled or postponed for one reason or another.  But yesterday, we finally made it back to the farm!

Upon our arrival, we were immediately greeted by one of Sandy's chihuahua pups, Spud. Grace loved the little two pound pup and carried him with her everywhere she went.

Spud was a bit bigger than he was the last time we saw him.

We were so happy to see the first peacock we ever hatched is doing quite well.  In the pic above you can see her beautiful green neck feathers.  Melissa is pretty sure the bird is a girl, therefore a peahen, so this is as colorful as she will get.  Below is a pic of the peahen a few days after she hatched in May. 

And then there were the geese.  Kate, Spence and the entire flock are all in fantastic shape.  We loved seeing them and hearing them all start honking as soon as we arrived made us feel like they had something very important to tell us. 

I'm sure you've noticed a very different looking goose in the center of the pic above.  The white goose with the long feathers is a rare and treasured Sebastopol Goose.  I discovered this breed of goose almost a year ago and thought they would be a great addition to Melissa's farm.  The eggs are prized and generally sell for between $20 and $30 dollars each. 

Melissa and I worked for several months to get our hands on six Sebastopol eggs, from those six eggs, I managed to hatch only two birds.  The eggs had been shipped in the mail so they had a much lower chance of hatching. 

Of the two eggs I hatched, we had one girl and one boy.  Unfortunately, our boy goose passed away about a month after he moved out to the farm.  We don't know why. 

Above, our little girl goose right after we hatched her in June.
And, below, our girl with her brother later that month.  He passed away shortly after this pic was taken. 

So that's were we are with the Sebastopol goose project.  One beautiful girl goose named Elizabeth Taylor who has the most amazingly blue eyes you've ever seen. 

Melissa and I have pre-ordered some more Sebastopol eggs and will hopefully have a friend for Elizabeth Taylor soon. 

I do love every single goose I've ever hatched, but isn't Elizabeth Taylor stunning?

In the pic above, you can see some of the black ducks we hatched last spring.  They still hang out with the geese they hatched with, instead of the other ducks. 

We returned from the farm with:

3 goose eggs - these are geese like Kate and Spence

1 white duck egg

5 chicken eggs

and

2 banty eggs

It was a great day at the farm.