Our First Chicken Egg Just Hatched! UPDATE #3: almost but not quite......

newly hatched

We are thrilled to announce our first attempt at hatching a chicken egg has been successful, so far!   The first of seven eggs abandoned by their mother hatched this morning, just a little while ago, and this little guy is quite active.  His/her siblings should be hatching soon too, we hope, since they were all laid the same day.

They will all be mixed breeds as we have one rooster, a white sex link, and several breeds of hens. We are hoping to see a bit of variation in the color/shades of the eggs these chicks will lay.

In any case, if they all hatch and survive we will have seven chickens that we didn't need to buy.

UPDATE: #2 Broke out of its shell about an hour ago.  It took about 6 hours and the poor little thing is so tired.

UPDATE TUESDAY, DAY 2:  The third egg hatched late last night but the poor little was worn out from working all day to break out of the shell and he died this morning.  The first hatched chick also died this afternoon.  It had been strong, but then I noticed blood on it's feathers and each time I checked on it, the situation had gotten worse.  Apparently the second chick had been brutalizing it.  I separated the culprit from the other two, but the damage was done.

So as of this posting, we have one chick out of seven eggs.
Three eggs hatched, four were duds, two birds died.