From the Obsessed Crafter

Okay, glitch in the road

Well, it's Saturday. The addition we are putting on the house actually looks like it may be a room soon. I have rafters up top and walls framed. Just waiting for hubby to close it in.

I have hit a small snag with the cockatiels. The chicks are doing well....all except for the youngest. He is so small that all the others get all the parents attention. He doesn't get much to eat, and is so tiny that everyone steps all over him and poops on him. He really isn't growing or gaining weight like he should. In the wild I am sure that he would succumb to what we know as survival of the fittest or mother natures natural selection. I won't stand for it. I can't watch the little sweetie starve and freeze. I handfeed babies all the time, but I have never fed one this young. He is only 5 days old now.

My birds have always waited until there were a few eggs laid before they start sitting. Did you know that a fertile egg can survive almost a month if it isn't sat on? Birds will lay and not sit on the eggs until they have a full or mostly full clutch laid. That way, the chicks develope at roughly the same pace. My pair, being first time parents, started to brood immediately (not uncommon) so that the oldest chick is over a week older than the last one hatched. I worried about this very thing when Ivan started to brood that first egg. If this chick survives, and I am pretty confident that it will, we'll end up keeping it. He's like the runt puppy of the litter....smallest, cutest and usually the sweetest. Dear to me because of the situation.

The brooder is set up. It's actually a tank with a heating pad underneath. According to my thermometer it's just about ready. I'll be feeding every 3 hours 24/7 for a couple of days. Once it's about 8 days old it will sleep through the night. This is gonna be fun.

On a Crafting note..........
I am waiting for lots of stuff in the mail. I ordered more handpainted roving(pictured below) from Maiysha I am waiting for a box of roving and fleece from a friend in SC....hi Raven! Waiting for my Spindolyn from Catherine at Knitting Anyway, and Carders from Webs. I can't wait for Maiyshas fiber. I have plans for it!

posted by Specialty Handcrafts @ 10:07 AM