Welcome to the world Sunday

Here's our very first hatchling, named Sunday.  She's (we're only assuming) a little black Australorp who surprised us yesterday morning when we went out to the chook house.

We're still waiting for the others to hatch, due on the 22nd December.  Mama hen, Kelly, was happily preening her little one when we peeked in.  Me,  I grabbed the camera and then thrust my arm in to try and get some good photos without being too distracting, but Kelly seemed quite content.

We inspected the shell and the children were fascinated with the networking of blood vessels (no, I didn't take photos of this).  However, to follow up on their curiosity, I've been told about this great site with video of a chick hatching, as well as photos and information on candling: 4-H Embyology.  We can see how big most of the other chicks should be now, at 14 days.