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   Prof. Sam Lawler (sundogplanets@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 02-Aug-2026 03:50:13 JST Prof. Sam Lawler

   One chick has hatched in the second batch of eggs. Hm. Not sure if there is a bunch more coming, or if this incubator is not as good as I hoped, or if this is a terrible time of year for hatching eggs (the 3rd option is almost certainly true... I usually only hatch eggs in the spring. But I didn't get the fancy incubator until summer, so... oh well.)

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     Prof. Sam Lawler (sundogplanets@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 02-Aug-2026 03:50:12 JST Prof. Sam Lawler

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     9 chicks! Looks like a few more eggs may still hatch.

     At first I put them in with the bigger, 3 week old chicks. But it looked like there was going to be some bullying.

     So the bigger chicks have now moved in with the mama hen and her babies. Very chill mama, and we watched carefully for a while. She definitely knows they are not her chicks, and doesn't want them closer to her, but the space they are in is large and it doesn't look like she's going to be mean to them.

     Steve's Place repeated this.
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     Prof. Sam Lawler (sundogplanets@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 02-Aug-2026 03:50:13 JST Prof. Sam Lawler

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     2 chicks have now hatched! Hopefully a few more will hatch overnight.

     And happy first tomato day!! Just barely squeaked that in before the end of July.

     And happy... apocalyptic sky day....?

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     Prof. Sam Lawler (sundogplanets@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 02-Aug-2026 03:50:13 JST Prof. Sam Lawler

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     When I peeked into the incubator earlier, there were 6 hatched chicks and several more pipped eggs! Hooray! I'll take them out of the incubator and have some cute floofball pictures to share later today.

     Chicks can easily go without eating or drinking for ~48 hours after hatching (that's why you can mail-order chicks), and I don't want to open the incubator and drop the humidity while other eggs are hatching. But I'm also very impatient...

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     Prof. Sam Lawler (sundogplanets@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 02-Aug-2026 03:50:37 JST Prof. Sam Lawler

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     Also the goats got new grass. Yay happy goats!

     I should definitely go do some weeding before it gets even hotter but ugh it's really hot already...

     Steve's Place repeated this.
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     Prof. Sam Lawler (sundogplanets@mastodon.social)'s status on Sunday, 02-Aug-2026 09:05:02 JST Prof. Sam Lawler

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     Chickies are still cute! And a couple more hatched!

     Pretty terrible hatch rate, though better than last time. Looking like it'll be something like 12 out of 45 rather than 7 out of 60 like the first round. Could be that fertility is just lower right now than in the spring (it's HOT and the day length is getting shorter). Or maybe I need to bump the temperature slightly lower next time.

     Who knows. Astrophysics is easy compared to biology. Too many variables!