Wednesday, November 01, 2006

I'M A GRANDPA!


Cigars all around! I’m a grandfather!

While at the Harvard of Christendom last week I had a brief chat with the Yaks about my finches. They are experienced finch breeders. They told me so when I posted in September about my birthday gift of a dozen finches from my lovely wife.

My finches have been laying eggs like crazy. I’m not kidding. Each apartment has at least ten eggs in it. This has been going on for well over a month. The first eggs appeared well before our move three and a half weeks ago. The birds started doing the dad and mom thing; hanging around in the apartments, sitting on the eggs, and acting all protective.

I was starting to worry. I have been unable to identify any actual “couples” among the birds. What? Am I going to have to do DNA tests to see which eggs belong to which birds?

But that was the least of my worries. Nothing was hatching. So last weekend I raised the subject with the Yaks. I was pretty sure all my eggs were duds. They seemed to confirm my suspicions. The first batch of eggs is often infertile.

I decided that when I got back to lovely, suburban, Caledonia, I would take out the apartments and empty out all the dud eggs. We could start over. It wasn’t really an emotional decision for me.

I didn’t get around to looking into the apartments until Tuesday. We had bought a bunch of white, cottony stuff for the birds to use as nesting material. They had taken a bunch of it and almost filled the apartments with it. Just as I was about to reach into the cage one of the female birds went into apartment number five and lifted up the cotton and there, under all that cotton, were at least two newly hatched chicks!

I puffed out my chest and walked out into the living room and proudly announced that I was a grandfather. That’s when all the excitement began. Quick, the internet said to boil some eggs for them and give them the eggs with the shells too! Quick, boil some carrots! They need fruit! I had triggered a veritable flurry of bird chefs, anxious to prepare delicacies for the finches!

Honestly, I don’t know what to do now. I suppose the parents birds will know. Do finches eat their young? I was just wondering.

Yes, of course I have pictures. It's just that for some reason Blogger won't let me upload them right now! Hmmm....

4 Comments:

Blogger OG said...

How many finch eggs are needed for a decent omelet?

7:24 PM  
Blogger Shiloh Guy said...

That's sick!

8:38 PM  
Blogger Smoking Christian said...

I was just going to say you must me skimming from the offerring plates because I would seriously be tempted to eat the eggs. I can't afford fresh protein for my family.

You know, years ago I babysat a friend's finches for a week in my apartment. Aren't they incredibly noisy and dirty? I wanted to enter these finches in an Olympic shot putting event. It seemed they could hurl their feces farther than any known animal. It didn't matter if I put 400 sq. ft. of newspaper under and around the cage, they cleared it without even trying. Where do you keep your little poop hurlers? I suspect soon you'll be Googling "finches, euthenasia."

1:13 PM  
Blogger Yakimaniac said...

Oh my gosh! Do you realize you could have 30 to 40 chicks? You have a baby factory there! I think that's illegal!

2:38 PM  

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