Broodies!!!

[The Phantom]

I have a flock of 18 and 6 of them are broody. I only have 4 nest boxes. Some of the bantams are doubled up. What should I do? The broody bantams are welsummer, Cochin, EE, the large fowl are 2 white rock, and a B. orpington.

 

[Ducksandchickens]

Can you make some new nesting boxes? Like use a box or something? That’s what I did once and it worked!

 

[chickengirl778]

Maybe you could just fill some boxes with straw in the run? They might like that!

 

[The Phantom]

Thankyou! I'll see what I can do

 

[Kessel23]

I like to keep my broodies in large dog crates or animal cages, separate from the main flock. Are you sure you want that many chicks? You might want to only have a few go broody because that many broody birds would be hard to maintain. You should definitely move some of them into separate cages because because if other birds have access to a broody hen's nest they will constantly be shoving her around and this can lead to broken eggs. Also, when the broody leaves the nest she sometimes returns to the wrong nest and abandons her other eggs.

 

[The Phantom]

I'm not sure they are going to hatch any. Lol

 

[aart]

Break them of their broodiness.

 

[Coykoi]

I have one hen that can't decide if she's broody. She waddles around with her feathers poofed out, making that cluck-cluck, but is still laying and doesn't tend the eggs. She's been doing this for weeks. She's a 1.5 year old Australorp, and has never gone broody before now. I think her hormones are kicking in, but not there enough to take her all the way over. In the mean time she's pretty funny, creeping around, pretending to be a turkey. Anyone else have a hen do this?

 

[Buffy the Wonder Cluck]

I have one hen that can't decide if she's broody. She waddles around with her feathers poofed out, making that cluck-cluck, but is still laying and doesn't tend the eggs. She's been doing this for weeks. She's a 1.5 year old Australorp, and has never gone broody before now. I think her hormones are kicking in, but not there enough to take her all the way over. In the mean time she's pretty funny, creeping around, pretending to be a turkey. Anyone else have a hen do this?

Yup. 9 mo old buff orp hen did that for nearly a month. On and off again. Finally left her be with an egg all day and she turned full broody this week. We’ve given her a few more eggs and she is becoming a very dedicated and wonderful mama. Funny thing is, once she turned, one of the barred rocks turned. Then another one. Now a RIR is toying with the idea. All hatchery chicks originally. We are very pleased to see them try. Broodiness seems to be like a virus, once one gets it, it spreads.

 

[Chang1993]

My bantam hens always doubled up like 2 on each nest boxes. I decided to build 4 large nesting boxes for them, so they have a successful hatch of 16 to 22 chicks depending how many eggs they lay and fertile. My total of bantam chicks per year are nearly 98 to 104. My bantam hens are ameraucana, old english, sebright, and d’anvers. They are breed to my 2 bantam roosters who is 1/4 of each breed as listed.