Best Broody Breed?

[animalsRawesome]

Thanks for all your suggestions!!

 

[purelypoultry]

I agree with Silkies! They are great little mamas also.

 

[PamB]

I only have silkies, so I don't have much to compare them to, but I ALWAYS have at least one broody out of my 12 girls.

 

[ghulst]

Yes Silkies will get broodie howeverThe best i have found is crossing a silkie cock with any good commercial layer. I did with gray leghorns . With them i could get broodies jan-dec. I did find that on the 2nd and 3rd generation when I did get silkie feather hens they didn't get as good a hatch in cold weather. I made the cross 25 years ago. I made do it again this year using ISA Browns.

 

[hinkjc]

All of my orpington color varieties are good broodies. My araucana are also excellent moms. They are much smaller than an orp, but that doesn't deter them from covering up those eggs. My araucana hen covered 10 large fowl eggs last year and hatched every one of them. The daddy araucana and other flock hens were helping her with the babies by offering them food. It was wonderful to see the nice interaction within the flock.

 

[jason_mazzy]

I would be interested in silkies crossed on White leggerns or brown leggerns. Prefer the whites. Have you ever done that?

 

[Chris09]

Most any Gamefowl but more so than any other breed I think the best broody hen would have to be American Gamefowl. Hands down the best broody hens I have ever had.

Chris

 

[Vanessabuffsnsilkies]

I have a cochin hen that just turned one year old and has never gone broody... silkies every other day.

 

[ghulst]

Many are good broodies however most you can't get early in the season. That is the avantage of the silkie crosses.

 

[Maggizzle35]

Quote:
I have had really good luck with cochin and one silkie. They took on the chicks after they were already hatched as adoptive mothers and it doesn't matter to them what kind of chicks they are full sized or banty. The thing I did notice about that was they weren't full grown hens except for the last one. Young hens seem to take to chicks that are already hatched easier than a hen that is laying and mating. Just my experience. I have a black silkie sitting and a duckwing banty sitting right now but I have never had any luck with the Orpingtons going broody but a Black Alstralope did once and she would have been a really good mom.