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So crowded!  Only a scant 2 weeks before, there was room for at least 20 eggs, and now they have to take turns who gets on top.

Or rather, they did have to take turns.  Not satisfied with the cramped quarters (and no longer getting food deliveries from mom or dad), a baby robin jumped out of the nest only 5 days after the last blog post!  Perhaps 'jump' isn't quite the right word, as it looked much more like an accidental step, followed by lots of wing flapping.

About 4 hours later, we looked over to find the second bird moving out of the nest, onto ajoining beam.  There was some experimental flapping, a wee look around, and then poof, a step off the edge.  That bird made a nicely controlled fall, completed with a slight bounce off the grass. 

The last two birds decided to stay put, perhaps luxuriating in the extra space. 

A day later, and again no food from mom or dad, 3rd chick decided to make a controlled fall directly from the nest, bouncing a bit more on the landing.  About 1/2 hour later, the last one popped down in a similar manner, and when we looked over, we noticed it flying/hopping over to an area in the adjacent trees containing an adult robin and a couple of the juveniles! 

It's common for juvenile robins to follow parents around for a numer of weeks after leaving the nest, perhaps remembering that elusive easy meal from bygone days, so now we've discovered an in-between period where adults keep tabs on, and perhaps help find food for, just-launched juveniles.

Once the baby robins were over their shock of leaving egg-dom, they began leaving their beaks up in the eternal "feed me" position.

We noticed that sometimes the babies had enough energy to get their heads up and over the nest wall.  Lucky for us, they sometimes didn't have enough energy to hunker back down, so we were able to get more pics!  They weren't old enough to open their eyes, and they had very little feathering (or skin-covering of any kind).

Below is the picture from this morning, about 7 days after hatching.  They've opened their eyes, they're replacing their initial downy coat with feathers, and they're beginning to look a bit crowded. 

We estimate that they'll fly off within another week or so.

We noticed a large amount of moss and sticks scattered on the front porch several weeks ago, and upon making sure that neither one of us was about to make an art project, we looked up to find several testing nests (ie., nests that were only 1/10 complete). The next day, the selection of nests was reduced to two, and they were getting more built up. By the third day, we saw that one nest was significantly bigger than the other, and more importantly, it had a robin sitting on it.

A couple days later, we got a closer look thanks to some creative mirror wrangling -- there was one lovely blue-green egg was sitting in the nest. Within the next 3 days, there were 4 eggs, which then led to 5-6 days of serious incubation by the robin mother.

Then, robin babies!

The chicks are slowly getting weened.  Mom is going off with the other chickens, ducks, and goose at the pond during the day, leaving the chicks at home to fend for themselves.  When everyone is together again in the late afternoon/early evening, she still watches out for them by nipping the bigger birds that get too close, but she's no longer saving food or actively hovering over them.

Indeed, on Tuesday she became testy and nipped many of the chicks who tried to snuggle up to her at night.  Currently, she only allows 4 or 5 lucky chicks snuggle time throughout the night (remember less than 5 weeks ago, when 20-30 chicks fit?), and certainly her patience for being stepped upon is approaching zero.

The ducks are now comfortable with the chicks, which is easy to see because they no longer stare wildly at the wee birds, nor do they run away when a chick approaches.  Another clue is the newly laid duck and chicken eggs sitting in the chick space.

Becoming a little older, larger, and getting more freedom, that's what weeks 3 and 4 were about.

The older chicks continued to snuggle with Mom as much as possible, though they also became more curious about the outside world.  During week 4, we opened up the chick fencing so that they could roam wherever and whenever they felt the need, but we kept the opening small enough that only they could fit back through for non-adult R&R.  Much running ensued.

The youngest chicks in the holding cell become bigger, more active, and very into sunshine.  The injured chick recovered nicely, and after we returned her to General Population, we turned her box into a space to sleep in and jump upon.

Notice that the same box from last week looks substantially smaller next to the growing chicks!
The chick on top of the box stood in the sun for a quite a while.

During week 4, we moved the youngest chicks outside, in their own fenced space to prevent Mom from pecking at them.  Since they didn't get Mom warmth, we gave them a warming light.  They did quite well in their own outside space, getting big and developed enough to begin blending in with the older chicks.  In week 5, we let all the chicks mix!

Week 2 of Chicks 2010 was filled with drama, rejection, and healing.  

Day 3, the day after my last post, Broody rejected some of the wee chicks, and they died in the cold night.  This was a bit shocking for us, as last year's adoption of chicks (and 3 turkeys) worked quite well.

Regrouping, we purchased more chicks on Friday, introducing them to Broody very carefully that evening.  While she initially nipped the small chicks that were peeping (since the week-old chicks had stopped such infantile behavior after day 3), it was dark, so she calmed quickly.  The next morning, however, we sufficiently disturbed Broody mom (while checking on the smallest additions) that she began noticing and again nipping the day-old chicks.

We made an emergency evac. of all day-old chicks, placing them in a warm alternate location (aka, the holding cell).  One of the chicks couldn't use her foot after getting pecked by Broody, so we gave her a smaller recovery space (and a playmate) right next to the rest of the chicks -- we're happy to report that she's almost healed.  Everyone has been warm and growing nicely, so we'll attempt to reintroduce them to Broody mom at the end of the week.

Success!  We completed our chick trickery last night, and when mom woke up, she had many new babies!

New chicks arrived 1 hour ago!  This year we ordered 35 males that are all different breeds (so many, in fact, that we have no idea which ones are which), and just like last year, we are cordially inviting the broody hen to raise them for us. 

We know it's best to sneak the chicks beneath mom at night, when all chickens are rather dazed, but we decided to see what would happen if we snuck in all 35 in the day.  It partially succeeded; she took about 8-9 underneath her before starting to peck at all the ones that were wondering about.  Given yesterday's snow, it's a bit chilly outside, so we quickly snatched up all the unlucky chicks for a second attempt this evening.

In the mean time, all the non-mommed chicks are in a box with food, water, and sources of warmth.

We often get inquiries from clients, partners, and perhaps the occasional stranger, about our farm and office, and we haven't elaborated on our environs beyond the About Us statements.

Well, that's easy to answer:  the office and farm are really the same thing.  Our solar-powered office is located on the second floor of the farm, and it's a lovely place to program with these here computers.  We have a lovely view of some beaver ponds, a brook, the animal spaces (including the former pig space, which is being used for blueberries, pear trees, garlic, lingonberries, and kiwis this year), and trees, trees, and more trees. Eileen and I both agree that the view is far better than from any office building that we've ever worked (even the awesome spaces of San Francisco!).

After a lovely warm April (it was about 65 on Sunday), it snowed 12 inches today.  So today's view includes some budding trees and lots of white!

Yes, that picture was taken today.

That skinny green thing in the center of the photo is one of our large lilacs. It just started unfurling its leaves 2 days ago, so it'll be nicely leafed in 2-3 weeks.

Earth day is here, and rather than talk about how spectacularly earthy we are, I'm going to talk about money and agriculture.

Most of you know that webmeadow is very into agriculture.  Back in city life, we noticed how little contact we had with our food sources, not having any real sense of where our food came from or how it was produced.  In moving to rural New Hampshire, we have become much more involved with our food sources:  raising small flocks of animals, having some wee veggie gardens, and participating in the Old Shaw Farm CSA.

We've learned massive amounts about raising animals and, more recently, plants (as we get further in the growing season, we'll hopefully have some great pictures of the blueberries, gooseberries, kiwis, and pear trees), and the biggest thing I've learned is how much everything we do is connected with the earth.  Realizing how important that connection is to us, we set out to help other people.

There are some fantastic charities in the world, like Heifer International, that donate agriculture basics (animals, seeds, etc.), enhance the donation by teaching sustainable techniques for growing the farm, and then require those farmers to help other farmers in the same ways in the future.  One of the things that struck us about charities like Heifer, however, is that while your donation is framed as "1 goat and 12 chickens" to a farm in the world, really your donation goes into the big pool that Heifer uses to do all of its works.  There's nothing wrong with that, but we wanted more hands-on impact.

Then we heard about Kiva, an organization that uses micro-loans to improve lives all around the world.  While micro-loans can seem, well, small, they have a huge impact (in fact, the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize went to a micro-loan pioneer).  With Kiva, we realized that we could improve the lives of specific people, and that because those people would be repaying the loan over time (with interest), we could lend even more money to others in the future -- quite a sustainable model.

We jumped on board in November 2009 by creating the agriculturally-focused Friends of Spruce lending team (named after one of our geese).  The Pixels & Pulp team immediately joined the group, and thus far we've been able to help more than 19 people!  Helping a specific number number of people, like 19, and being able to read updates from them makes us feel like our impact is very real.  In fact, if you'd like to increase the impact, feel free to join our lending team by clicking the "Join Now" button on the Summary page.

Earth Day is about focusing on our impact on the earth.  Today, at least 19 people around the world are able to connect with the earth more sustainably because of the micro-loan lending model.