A Broody Leghorn, Who Would Have Thought It Possible?!

So the first day I noticed her setting, I thought uh oh, she's injured. She picked a spot on the floor of the feed stall underneath my saddles. She let me know she was fine, but to back away slowly and she meant business. Several days later, she's still on the nest. Every day I checked her, I expected her to have left the nest because as we all know, Leghorns are the last thing to go broody. They are so anti-mothers that I'm convinced the breed wouldn't continue if not for artificial incubation. Or so I thought. Amazingly, she sat tight on her eggs the entire time, acting no less diligent and committed than my true broody type breeds, and this morning when I went to check her, she had that "I've got chicks" purr noise going on. I thought no way in heck, but sure enough, I saw one chick peeking its head out. So I tossed some chick starter to her and when I came back with the camera, she has at least 3 chicks. She's still got more eggs under her, I don't know if they'll hatch or not as they belong to another brown hen that laid eggs in her nest.

But here she is with her chicks. For proof, ya know, since I wouldn't believe it without photos myself, LOL.



Has anyone else had a leghorn go broody and actually hatch her clutch? In the 7 yrs I've had leghorns, this is a first. We had them when I was a kid too, about 100 hens, and I don't remember a single one ever setting on her eggs.