Broody hatch question

IttyBiddyRedHen

Songster
8 Years
Jul 30, 2011
1,099
115
211
East coast
Question on broody hens and eggs;
How many days after a hatch are remaining eggs still viable? The majority of the chicks, 7, hatched around Wednesday, April 4th. They are all healthy, chirpy and bouncy. 2 eggs remain unhatched. One has a pip (?) in the shell...not on the end. The other has nothing, no cracks, nothing. The broody is still sitting close on them seems like, although she did get off today to stretch and poop.
Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.





 
Last edited:
Just wanted to see if you had managed to get an answer to your question and to congratulate you on your new chicks. They are beautiful!
 
Kind of answered it myself. I pulled the eggs Saturday. Cracked them open. Both were non viable, never got past the "breakfast stage". Neither were rotten either. Mama hen was happy to get off the nest too. Her and the babies needed food and exercise.

At least we have 7 healthy chicks!
 
Glad all worked out for you. Your thread makes a great introduction for a subject I'd like to discuss.

My wife and I are new to this process as we've only had our birds for about a year. They are all hens, and our cochin went broody a few days ago and doesn't want to get out of that mode so we decided to get her a few (4) muran eggs to sit on. While we figure the bird knows instinctively what to do, we still have some questions that we'd like to ask.

We have 7 hens. All a year old - The cochin, a red, a buff, 3 wyandottes, and a polish. All are extremely tame and get along very well. They are handling A LOT, always run up to you, and enjoy being pet. None of them pick at each other. Even our dog and cat are accepted in the pen without any upset - and the cat even seems to have taken up guard for the birds ever since we lost one to a hawk attack last fall. We often find the cat laying in the pen, and the birds love to stay close by her.

Our coop has an open entrance and has three nesting boxes in it elevated about 6 inches off the floor. Each box has a 2 inch lip to keep eggs from rolling out. The coop also has roosting bars, and the floor itself is elevated about 2 feet off the ground. The birds sleep in the coop and lay eggs in the coop. Other than that they run freely in the pen and/or the garden.

The three nesting boxes are all side-by-side. That's more than enough normally as all the birds like to use the same nest. The cochin went broody in the middle box (their favorite), so everyone else is using the left box now.

Questions...

1) Is it OK to let her stay on her eggs in this coop? Or do I really need to seperate her?

2) When the eggs do hatch, must I seperate the chicks (and her) from the flock (assuming I did not in question 1)?

3) Do we really need to set up a brooder in our situation? or will the cochin take care of this part of the process herself?

Thanks to all for advice.
 
You should start your own thread on this. This is what we call hijacking someone else’s post. I’m not trying to be mean or picky. You are more likely to get better answers on your own. And try to be a little descriptive of your subject or question in the title. It helps get the right people’s opinion.

Welcome to the forum, by the way. Glad you joined us.

Hens have been hatching and raising chicks with the flock for thousands of years. You don’t have to separate them from the flock. Some people separate the hen while she is incubating, some separate while she raises the chicks, some do both, some do other things. It’s not that one way is right and everything else is wrong. You may have a unique circumstance that makes one way better than another but often it’s just the way you choose to do it.

If you decide to let her hatch with the flock, mark the eggs you want her to hatch and start them all at the same time. I just make a couple of circles on the eggs with a Sharpie. Then every day, check under her and remove any unmarked eggs. The broody should do the rest.

When the eggs hatch, the Cochin should take complete care of them. She has an internal heater that never gets disconnected or loses power. All you need to do is have feed and water at a level the chicks can reach.
 
You should start your own thread on this. This is what we call hijacking someone else’s post. I’m not trying to be mean or picky. You are more likely to get better answers on your own. And try to be a little descriptive of your subject or question in the title. It helps get the right people’s opinion.

Welcome to the forum, by the way. Glad you joined us.

Hens have been hatching and raising chicks with the flock for thousands of years. You don’t have to separate them from the flock. Some people separate the hen while she is incubating, some separate while she raises the chicks, some do both, some do other things. It’s not that one way is right and everything else is wrong. You may have a unique circumstance that makes one way better than another but often it’s just the way you choose to do it.

If you decide to let her hatch with the flock, mark the eggs you want her to hatch and start them all at the same time. I just make a couple of circles on the eggs with a Sharpie. Then every day, check under her and remove any unmarked eggs. The broody should do the rest.

When the eggs hatch, the Cochin should take complete care of them. She has an internal heater that never gets disconnected or loses power. All you need to do is have feed and water at a level the chicks can reach.
Are you talking to me on this? hijacking a thread? If so, I tried to find the information by looking in the other threads, but got nowhere. That's the only reason I started this one.
 
No, Moxies, this is your thread. You are the OP (original poster). You control it and can take it anywhere you wish as long as it is within forum rules. I should have been more clear. I was talking to Woodruff.

We do it all the time but when you post a new question in someone else’s thread you often don’t get the answers you want or need. It’s pretty hit or miss on here as to who sees your thread. If you put a decent title on it, the people you want to see it are more likely to see it. If it is hidden in another thread, especially one that a lot of people have already looked at, your odds of the right people seeing it go way down.

Moxies, I didn’t see your post when you first put it up. If I had I’d have possibly responded. There are several other regulars on here that would have probably responded if they had seen it. That’s what I mean by hit or miss. There is so much traffic on here things sometimes get lost. Nothing wrong with your post or title, just bad luck it didn’t get an answer. That’s why you need a good title to at least let people know what you are talking about.

I’m not trying to be the forum police. The moderators do a great job of that when it is required. I’m just trying to make a helpful suggestion to someone (Woodruff) that is new to the forum.
 
Last edited:
Thanks to everyone. That was my instinct - to let her instincts take over. I really forsee no problems - just wanted to hear somone else's oppinion on letting the little ones be raised in the presence of the flock. The only thing I think I will do is put together a smaller area away from the nesting boxes where the cochin will be able to raise her young and let them move around somewhere besides the poopey coop floor:)
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom