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Good and bad news today. I got itchy and candled one of the incubator eggs. There’s definitely growth! Will do the rest this weekend so the hubby can see too. Bad news is that we lost one of our hens to body lice. We have never had a parasite problem before and didn’t realize that hens can...

Our eggs went into the incubator today! We will wait a week to candle them to see if we have growth (as suggested in the incubator directions). Fingers crossed!

I will probably start incubating in the next week or so. I was also going to ask how long everyone else’s chickens have continued to lay eggs? Our older hens are almost 3 and only one of them still lays eggs. Our younger ones (two of them) are a year old and only one consistently lays.

That’s a good point, thanks. We do not have a broody as of now. Maybe when it warms up one of the girls will change.

We are going to try to hatch some of our eggs in a fully automatic incubator for the first time. I’ve heard that some breeds are notoriously difficult to hatch. I was wondering if Swedish Flower hens are difficult? Any tips? Thanks!

It’s hard to say until they get a bit older. Out of our new additions we ended up with more roosters than hens :/

Elsa’s tail feathers are looking pretty long already too so she might be an Elmer :) we have 3 roosters out of our recent chicks and the 3rd took the longest to look for sure like a rooster. I’m interested to hear from other’s if it holds true that only roosters have yellow legs

Our roosters have yellow legs and hens have cream colored. I don’t know if this always holds true! The combs with hens can vary. Our older hens do have a sizable red comb but our newer hens do not. (Just variation within the breed).

Hi all - have not been on for a while but I’m seeking opinions about our hens... they’re not laying this year! Last year we had more eggs than we could handle. This year we only had one hen laying eggs and now she’s gone broody. The hens are about 2 years old. Same food, lots of fresh water...

From our original flock we ended up with 3 roosters. Two were great and one was very very aggressive.

Thanks for the info! They are very cute! funny to see them without a comb since all of ours have them :)

Hi - been a while since I have been on the boards as well. A question to everyone: where did your swedish flower hens come from?? We live in NV (near the CA border) and received chicks by mail a couple years ago. That breeder is no longer breeding. Wondering where everyone’s chicks or eggs...

Yes it's the losing condition that bothers me as well or I would let her be. Since the others have been a little slower in their laying recently I don't mind closing the coop for a full day. I tried a few hours yesterday but we had a sudden wind storm so I opened it again so they could get in if...

Thanks for the info! The bullseye is what I have seen in pictures that I don't usually try to find when cooking :) We originally had 3 roosters. They got along for a while and then became apparent that we had to get rid of one so the lowest guy on the totem got a new home. Then our highest guy...

Next question... how long does it take to break a broody hen? The only way I can keep her out of the nesting boxes is to physically remove her and then close the door to the coop. But none of the other hens can go in to lay either.

Yes it's the white dot that I don't always look for so I guess I'm not sure how many of our eggs are really fertile or not. We were under the impression that a blood spot indicated fertility sometimes too. I have heard of the saddles, but with the heat and the way they like to get into the dirt...

Some of our eggs are obviously fertile with a little red spot. We have seen other pictures of fertile eggs that don't have a red spot, but another kind of "mark" on the yolk that I wouldn't necessarily notice. Maybe our rooster isn't very good :p I feel bad about their feather loss from him...

Well it's a no go on our baby chicks. Candled all of them today and none are viable or even looked fertile to any extent (after almost 2 weeks of being sat on between the 2 hens). We do on occasion get a fertile egg so it was possible... but I guess it was more of a hormonal change for the...

Thanks for all of the info! We've only had these guys for a year so it's been a learning curve. I might look into increasing their protein or just reducing the ratio of scratch as we do have everyone living and eating together. The greens that we give are extras from our greenhouse more as a...

Hmm it's probably the heat then. I still have not seen our broody hen off the eggs and out for food/water but I imagine she must be getting up?? I finally got two eggs from another hen but one was already cracked and the other cracked while I was washing it. I do give them watermelon, strawberry...