Quick chick update

So the birds have been with us less than a week and are already replacing their fluffy chick fuzz with little feathers. Some more successfully than others, I must say. Chicky and Chicky-chicky-chicky have beautiful little wing feathers all coming in now while Odile looks like she's been beat up a bit. Her feathers are coming in too, but not all pretty and shiny, it looks like she just woke up and hasn't brushed her hair yet. Drumstick is plump and docile, she is still the most fluffy and fuzzy of the lot.

In other news, Nikita has finally taken notice of the chicks. I was in the playroom cleaning the brooder when the noise finally roused her from her chair. She was all alert and intense, every muscle in her body quivering with excitement. I let her sniff a chick I was holding and praised her for being quiet and calm but she really wanted to obsessively lick the poor little critter and I just couldn't let that happen. From the first moment forward she is all about the chicks. She runs directly to the playroom door as soon as anyone moves as though she sincerely believes we'll just open the door and let her at the chicks. The roll out mesh baby gate on the door to the playroom has been partly shredded by her incessant scratching at the door and she lays right at the threshold whining and grumbling to us for hours at a time. I kind of expected this from her, with her pit bull tenacity and all, but I'm going to keep working with her to understand that they are off limits. And I'll be building them a sturdy coop when they're ready to move outside. Pit bull sturdy.