Chapter 23 #2
“Well, now that you have a wife and five kids, you shouldn’t lack for people to help you out.”
“That’s what I figured.” He grinned at her.
She snapped off the plastic tie and handed the knife back to him. Then, she carefully lifted the corner of the lid.
The chicks were adorable, peeping and blinking as the light slowly filtered into their tight home.
“Oh. They’re adorable.” She didn’t touch them, although she was tempted, because she didn’t want all the kids to think they needed to touch them too.
“I have water and feed over in the barn. When we get them out of the box, we’ll dip their beaks in the water, to show them where it is.
I’ve never had a problem with chicks finding the water, but I’ve always just dipped their beaks in one at a time to give them a taste of it, so they don’t die of thirst before they get it figured out. ”
“They’re probably two or three days old and right at the limit of what they can survive.”
“Exactly. And shipping is a little bit stressful on them, although that’s why you have to get at least fifteen, so that they stay warm without the heat light.”
“You have a heat light too?”
“I do. We’ll keep it on them for the first four weeks. After they grow their adult feathers, they’ll be able to keep themselves warm without it.”
“Wow. Okay. My goodness,” she murmured, unable to resist putting one finger out and touching a downy head. So soft, so delicate.
“Let me!” Banks said.
“No, chicks are one animal that are better off if they’re not handled a whole lot. So it’s best if we just look and don’t touch.” Wilson said that matter-of-factly, but he probably understood how difficult it was going to be for Banks especially to not touch.
He was at that age where he wanted to touch everything, although thankfully he was past the stage where he wanted to touch it all and put it in his mouth too.
“All right, guys, let’s head over to the barn. Gifford, if it’s okay with your mom, you can carry the box of chicks over.”
“That’s fine with me. Should I put the lid back on?”
They were so cute huddled together, and she wanted to be able to look at them, but she remembered what he had said about them jumping out.
“Yeah. You better cover them up, and then Gifford needs to be careful not to jostle them too much.”
“I’ve got it.” He sounded so grown-up and competent.
Charity glanced at him, looking so serious as he picked the box up, careful to do exactly what Wilson had said.
She wasn’t quite sure why he was having so much trouble in school.
It didn’t seem to be any one thing, he just wasn’t getting good grades, didn’t always pay attention in class, and sometimes the teacher had to send a note home from school that he had pushed someone down at recess or had been mouthy to the teacher.
Charity assumed that all had something to do with his dad leaving and all the other changes in his life, but she wasn’t sure. And she definitely didn’t know what to do about it.
Regardless, he seemed very enamored with the new chicks and proud of his role carrying them over.
Charity would have to remember to thank Wilson for the extra attention that he had been giving Gifford.
Gifford seemed to thrive under the little bit of responsibility that he was allowed to have.
Maybe that would pull him back from whatever bad path he was traveling down.
They made it to the barn, and sure enough, Wilson had indeed made an entire chicken coop, with boxes for laying and bars for roosting, and in the middle, he had a little area sectioned off with a heat light over top and feed and water close by.
The heat light was on, and everything was ready for the chicks to come out.
“All right, we’re going to let your mom do this, and if she thinks Gifford and Banks are old enough to help, they can do it as well. The rest of us are just going to watch. Maybe someday it will be our turn.”
“But I want to help!” Lavinia said.
“And I’m sure you can, when you get a little bit bigger,” Charity said, not wanting Wilson to have to be the bad guy all the time.
The little girls fussed a bit, but Gifford and Banks were so excited about pulling them out, and dipping their beaks in the water, and then allowing them to run around. Soon all fifteen were out, and they realized they had an extra one.
“Maybe they sent an extra one in case one died. Every once in a while, we do lose one.”
“Oh boy. We have sixteen.” She hated to show her ignorance, but she had to ask. “How many eggs will we get from them every day?”
“If we were a commercial layer facility, where we could tightly control the amount of daylight they had, and the feed and other environmental factors, we could have them up to ninety-five percent, which means that ninety-five percent of them would lay one egg a day. But for what we’re going to do, it’ll be good if we get eighty percent, which means eighty percent of sixteen, so that many eggs each day once they start laying. ”
“Well. My goodness. I guess you guys better start eating a lot of eggs.”
“They’re nice to give away. You can’t sell them, because they’re not USDA inspected, but you can give them away, or you can take donations for them.”
“Wow. Maybe I can use them in my baking?”
“I don’t think you can do that either, but we’ll have to check the regulations and see.”
“All right. Whether I can or not, it’s going to be fun,” she said, feeling excited and happy and so totally seen, like Wilson knew exactly what to do in order to make her smile.
She wasn’t sure what she could do to make it up to him, but it was definitely something she was praying about.