Further new arrivals...1 day old chicks...cute

Wow! the lovely Joyce, from down the road at Whiorau Farm where many birds of all kinds are producing eggs and living the good life, called this morning with the news that I was again a proud MUM!

Only this time I am Mum to 9 baby chicks who'd hatched out variously yesterday May 21 2008.

So we have 9 gorgeous black/grey babies all furry and soft with down and smudgey patches of baby yellow on a few crowns, bibs, wings, tummies and bottoms...wondering what breeds or cross-breeds we have...so small, so sweet.

Phoebe, of course, is intimately acquainted already and I feel today like the Godzilla of Mother Hens, doing my ultimate best to protect these tiny (probably not fragile!) new lives and guide/educate our wonderfully inquisitive 4 year old human child and her furiously curious fingers!!