1st hen just went broody on me--what now???

[futurefarmer08]

Hi everyone,
I know there must be a lot of answers out there but if someone could just let me know what they think so I will know what to do.
I am so new. My first hen ever has been laying for about a month. We went out of town for 4 days. Had someone housit and when we got back she was broody on some eggs.We removed the eggs, because they are not fertile. We only have two hens. We were enjoying the eggs.We would like to continue to get eggs! She is about 6 mo old. Is that too young to be broody? Should I get some fertilized eggs asap to put under her or will she snap out of her broody spell? She is a BC Marans. Her sister is wondering what the heck is going on and why she won't come out to play?
Please advise asap.
Thanks so much

 

[Redsquirrel]

Do you want to hatch out eggs under her or get her unbroody?

 

[chickenchik12]

let her set fertile eggs or if you dnt want more chicks give her fake eggs to sit on but she will be broody like it or not.

 

[MaggieRae]

If you want, you can stop her from being broody. It won't prevent her from going broody in the future, but there are plenty of ways to stop it now.

If you want babies, you could find some fertile eggs in your area, though I don't know if she'd still be broody in time to have them shipped. If you do try to hatch some, make sure you keep an incubator set up just in case.

 

[futurefarmer08]

What could I do to get her to not be broody? I am kind of torn, on whether or not to just get fertile eggs or try to unbroody her. I want more chickens, but we seem to get more than our share of roos!

 

[MaggieRae]

I've heard of various methods, but the most common one I've heard of is to put the broody hen in a wire cage (with nothing but wire on the bottom) with food and water for a day or two. The air flow shows them there aren't any eggs underneath them and supposedly they come out of it pretty quick.
If you do a search for breaking a broody, you should get a bunch of different methods.

 

[futurefarmer08]

Thank YOU!!! I will do that. I just put in Broody hen and there were too many matches for me to check all of them.
Thanks everybody!

 

[msgenie516]

Quote:
Hi,

I think you made the right decision! I had read somewhere that you can try and break them from the broodiness or let it run its course. Well, I made the mistake of letting two broody bantam cochins remain broody until they were ready to stop and both of them stayed broody for an entire THREE MONTHS! No harm came to them (I saw both of them taking eating and drinking breaks and also letting go of some HUGE, NASTY poops) but three months is just too long to let them sit there and I will never do that again.

Good luck with your broodies!

Genie

 

[19hhbelgian]

I just had a hen decide to go broody. I figured, what the heck... I got some eggs for her to hatch out

They are due to hatch end of next week... Can't wait!

I have 7 layers though (include little miss broody), so 1 less won't hurt. If I only had 2 hens, I most likely wouldn't have left her sit. It's funny though, I have to check underneath her when I go for eggs... My other girls will go in her box, lay their non-fertile egg, and get out! I hate disturbing her, but she's very good about it

 

[mxpres]

I broke my hen from the broody spell in about four days using the wire bottom cage,I don,t have a rooster and didn,t have fertile eggs.make sure she has plenty of food and fresh water,and don,t give in when she acts like she is in misery because she can,t get out,the cage method is simple and so easy and works great if you don,t want the hen to hatch or sit on non fertile eggs which is pointless and a waste of time,,,,,