broody error need help...

[whatthecluck]

So Ruby my barred rock has been sitting on eggs for 12 days now. I hadnt sectioned her off yet from the rest of the hens...was going to do it this weekend but she has been doing fine

Yesterday when we went to feed/water/collect eggs we saw her eggs with the "X"s in the box next to her and she had evidently gotten off at some point in the day to eat and drink and then got back on the wrong nest.....setting upon a similar number (1 less) of eggs in the box next to her unborn chickies. Her chickie eggs were cold to touch. Of course I took the fresh eggs and she sat right back on her eggs to incubate.....fwd to just now.
This evening I candled them.....day 12.....of 8 eggs...one was crushed accidentally by her foot....one looks like veining had begun then stopped. The other 6 all have veining.....and chicklets...but none had movement. I "youtube.com-d" and see movement in the eggs candled in videos quite clearly unlike my own

. So here are all these warm little eggs with half formed babies due to arrive on Friday the 25th or Saturday the 26th....none of which look to my untrained first timers eye like they are going to hatch

So......I am guessing they wont come back to life or are hiding their movement right?

And so will she just sit there on them waiting like that? When will she get off? Should I slip her new eggs or will she abandon the new eggs early because she was already broody over a week before I gave her eggs to set on to hatch?
Should I just order day olds and slip them in her easter basket lol...friday night the 25th? If yes......Where can I order day olds to guarantee they would come in then?
Um....help?

 

[Ridgerunner]

I cannot help you with interpretting the candling. I would advise patience, especially as you are new at it, but you have more experience at candling than I do. As for your other questions.

She should remain on the eggs indefinitely. Chickens don't have a clock. They do not know when 21 days are up. Eventualy she will get up and quit brooding, but it could easily be another couple of months. There is really no way to know for sure.

If you decide to abandon the 6 eggs, (and I would be very patient with them) you could start new eggs and she will probably hatch them. If you want to try to give her day old chicks, you can do that now. She does not know when the 25th is.

There is no guarantee she will accept day old chicks, now or on the 25th. I think your chances are very good if you try it, but you have to be ready to raise them yourself if she does not accept them.

My Pet Chicken is the only place I am aware of that will ship less than 15 chicks for sure. Unless you are in a major metro area, their minimum is probably 8. They put a heat pack in with the chicks. There is another one (Ideal Poultry) that you have a minimum $25 order and not a specific number, but I think they may ship additional packing peanuts so you can't be sure how many you would actually get. Somebody may correct me on that one.

Good luck! Hopefully a candling guru will see this and respond. I'm still hoping those 6 are still good.

 

[bloomnbeauty]

I had a first time broody hen get off her nest after two weeks. She had been off all day and the eggs were stone cold when I decided to try incubating them. Of 14 eggs 13 of then hatched a week later. though when I candled them they showed no movement.
I would give them a little while at least.

 

[lucky123]

Randall Burkey Co will ship as few as 5 chicks ,but I bought 25 pullets from them for less than they want for five.