Relaxed Farming - our farm in your classroom

A fabulous sight in the incubator this morning: seven very active turkey chicks. Some, as the first photo shows, were still wet showing they had not long hatched out. You can also clearly see the egg tooth on the still-damp bird: this is the paler pointed tip of its beak and it was this egg tooth that helped the chick to break through the shell. The egg tooth is very sharp at both its tip and along the edges, allowing the bird to 'saw' through the shell once the initial hole has been made. Most birds and a lot of reptiles have an egg tooth which after a few hours/days break off/wears down as once the bird/reptile is hatched the egg tooth is no longer needed. It takes a lot of effort to break out of an egg so in addition to the egg tooth, birds have a special 'pipping' muscle in their necks that gives them the strength to push through the shell.
By the end of the day the numbers of chicks had risen to ten and once all were really dry and fluffed up (as in the second photo), we moved them from the incubator and put them in our tall aviary inside the barn which at this time of year doubles up as a brooder. The chicks that were in there are now in a more open stall in the barn. They still have a heat lamp and need to stay inside for a while but they now have more space and a lot more straw to peck around in the inside barn
And STILL nothing from Onion. We spoke to our vet this morning who said that day 155 (i.e. Monday) was a maximum and if she had not produced by then, we would need to give her a special drug to encourage her to give birth. She continues to be fine considering the enormous weight she is carrying and at times her 'noisy' breathing. Thyme is showing signs that she is 'thinking' of giving birth: we have the starry eyes and a fair bit of standing/sitting in the corner, although her teats are not yet full of milk so we have another few days to wait. It certainly would be nice for little Ebony to have some playmates...