Broodiness or not? Is my chicken sick?

[bethann33]

Is my chicken ok? I thought she was just going broody, but now the behavior is going beyond. I took out the eggs from the nestbox- she still lays in it and refuses to leave and will peck my hand when I get close. I moved the nestbox, she will still lay in the spot where the nestbox used to be. and she is MISSING ALL OF HER UNDER FEATHERS. Does this normally happen when a hen is 'broody' or is there some illness that I am not seeing?

 

[chicmom]

Everything you describe is normal behavior for a broody hen. They pull out their belly feathers so that their skin can be in direct contact with the eggs. They will sit in an empty nest box too. You might think they never get up, but they do come out usually once a day, and hurry around, eating drinking and take a huge dump.

 

[bethann33]

Thank-you for clearing this up. It is my first time having a hen go broody, so I didn't know what to expect. How long will she do this? Her eggs aren't even fertilized, as I don't have a roo. Should I let her pretend with an egg?

 

[Kimquat]

One of my silkies is behaving exactly the same way right now (we also have no roo). In fact, she pecks at me when I move her from the nesting box to take any eggs she might be sitting on. When I lifted her up today, she pecked at me and then sort of leaned over on her side while I checked for eggs. She lay on her side for a bit and looked quite pitiful, which made me feel horrible. I want to do the right thing, but I don't know what that is!

 

[animallover505]

buy hatching eggs!

 

[KootenaiRiverChick]

We had a very broody hen that would not stop no matter what we tried. Went on for two months or so. She rarely ate/drank, pulled out all of her belly feathers, would not leave the nest, hoarded the eggs, growled and poofed up, all the same stuff. We finally bought two, four-day old chicks (ideally should be one- or two-day old) and stuffed them under her at night after she was asleep. It's been almost four weeks and she's a great mama, chicks are doing super! Bummer part is that I'm thinking the broodiness is contagious as another hen is now exhibiting the same blasted behavior.

Good luck!