Broody Hen Hatching Eggs During Winter?

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RiotRoo

RiotRoo

In the Brooder
Oct 20, 2015
15
3
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I'm fairly new to chickens and hatching eggs so bare with me!

About a week ago one of my silkie hens went broody (for the first time since I've had her), and has been sitting on a single infertile egg. I wanted to give incubating a go so I bought some silkie eggs online and I'm awaiting their arrival (should be tomorrow!). I kind of wanted to give some of them to my hen and allow her to hatch them, however I'm in NH and it's now November so it gets very cold. The inside of my coop is actually in my garage, so it stays pretty warm, and we're working on an addition to the inside that will be heated with lamps just in case it starts to get cold they will have a particularly warm spot to go to.

Will my hen be able to hatch some eggs even though we're going into winter, or should I just put them all in the incubator? I would really like to see her be able to hatch, but I don't know if it's worth the risk!
 
I don't see any reason why the hen would abandon the eggs. Broody hens can sit for months if you don't break them.
Id suggest giving all the eggs to the hen - makes life so much easier when they do hatch (plus your hatch rate is likely to be higher).

CT
 
I have had a hen sit for over two months( with me feeding her) trying to hatch eggs that kept going bad on her the bantam roosters weren't able to "get" her because of her fluffy butt, I finally had to stop her because she had been sitting too long. . my Bantam cochin Nimue went broody on a golf ball in the coldest part of last year. And refused to be moved until I finally gave her some fertile eggs I had saved for the incubator. And she went on to hatch a lovely bunch of chicks.
 
Oh that's great to hear! I think I will give her most of the eggs. Anything special I should do to keep the chicks safe and warm after they are born, or will mama take care of all that?
 
I have a broody hen, my eggs were not fertile so I gave her 4 leghorn/EE eggs, 1 brown from a neighbor farm. but one white one was not fertile so I was back to just 4.

A few days later for my incubator, I got 7 RIR eggs from a diff friend, and 3 green eggs and 2 brown spotted

in the incubator...




eggs from yet an even diff. friend. then got a call from that gal saying she had 3 more green eggs. They will be a little stagered, but I have done that before. They will have their own closed of coop area with an attatched (very securely) a heat lamp.

These are all do later part/half of Nov. on the 11,12 they are planning to have 2 six hr. black outs, fun huh? I am going to get some handwarmers, not place the eggs directly on them but have buffer inbetween.

I have survived a black out before, once we lost power for 6 hrs before 2 of my eggs were due in 2 days. I placed them in my blouse at bed time and breathed on them all night. they hatched just fine 2 days later.
 
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