‘Can I help?’ Silky Josephine asks. 
    Eighteen days are up, and it’s time to remove our incubating eggs from the cradles of their mechanical turner. 
     We’ll add a dash of water to the incubator and replace them in a cluster, points down, as near to nest-like as possible. 
     Silky can be very gentle when it comes to picking things up, but putting things down has always been another issue entirely. 
    ‘How about you make sure that I have the pointiest ends facing downward,’ I tell her. ‘It’s hard for me to tell which is which, and it’s very important that we be right about it.’ 
      And it is. 
     And like a good mother ...not a hen, but a good mother ...Silky Josephine nudges and nuzzles her babies until they are cozy close, their points all perfectly facing downward, ready to hatch.