BROODY hen hatches 6 chickies (w/pics) *update now 9 chicks*

[Jayare's Chicks]

Well I think my Gold Phoenix has gone broody. She stayed in the coop all day while all the others came outside to free range. She was only sitting on the golf ball I have in the nests so earlier in the day I sliped a couple of eggs in under her and she stayed on them the rest of the day. When it started gettig dark and all the other chickens started comming back to the coop to roost I took her out of the coop and put her in a hutch by herself and moved those 2 eggs and placed 3 more eggs in there with her. She didn't go back to those eggs for a while as she has never been in this hutch before but after about an hour in there she started sitting on the eggs again. I took 3 more eggs out there and slid them under her also and she is sitting on them now too. I think there are 8 eggs under her if I remember right so I'll see what she does over the next few days and hopefully she stays there and hatches them out.

Wish us luck!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jayare

added pics to the title

 

[silkiechicken]

Good luck! Hope she can make a good momma hen!

 

[Jayare's Chicks]

Well so far so good. She has been sitting on those eggs all day. I put an assortment of eggs under her and it will be interesting to see what hatches out.
I do have a bator out in the shed if I need to fire it up at some point but I am hoping she sticks it out for the duration.

Jayare

 

[valmom]

Good luck! I am hoping one of ours will go broody sometime this spring (after the danger of frozen eggs is over). We have a dog crate set up with plastic Easter eggs filled with sand for them to "trial" set on. They are laying eggs in the crate with the fakes, but, so far no one is really setting.

What can I do to encourage broodyness?

 

[Jayare's Chicks]

Well she is still sitting on those eggs and when I looked to see how many eggs were there yesterday when she got up to stretch and eat or drink I counted 7 eggs. They are an assortment from the 5 chickens that were laying then. Today I put 3 more eggs in there with her and 1 is from another hen that just started laying so there is at least 1 egg from all 6 hens that are old enough to lay right now.

My thought is if the first 7 eggs hatch I can take the chicks out and she can sit on the other 3 eggs for another week and she can hatch and raise these herself while I take the other 7 and raise them in the brooder inside.

Has anybody else done a staggered hatch with a broody hen before? Does this work or am I just messing with her head too much?

Jayare

 

[Poison Ivy]

Congrats on the broody. My girls are driving me crazy. 1 frizzle girl went broody 2 weeks ago followed by my 2nd frizzle girl and sunday the 3rd girl followed and now my only silkie girl that lays is now broody! So I have 4 girls sitting on air and I've tried to break them and their not having any of it.

 

[Jayare's Chicks]

Do you have any eggs to slide under them?

Jayare

 

[Poison Ivy]

All the eggs are in the incubator. I really don't want them to hatch them out. But they are bound and determined to do it. lol

 

[Jayare's Chicks]

YEAHHHH!!!

Well today I went to look in the hutch and as I started getting closer to it I could hear little chickies crirping. I could see at least 3 of them before they went back under mom.
2 of them are Phoenix and 1 of them is a little black chick. I don't know who the mother is to the black one yet but it's either 1 of the 2 RIR's or my Delaware cross. The roo had to be one of my black Australorps before I got rid of them.
I will try to get some pics of them if I can catch them when they are not under mom sometime. There is supposed to be 7 that were to hatch tommorrow (Tuesday is day 21) and 3 next Wednesday (April 16th) and 2 more the next Tuesday (April 22nd).

Jayare

 

[Jayare's Chicks]

Well I went out there to put some water (at chickie level-with marbles in it) and some chickie food at their level also and the black one was out so I got 1 pic of it before the batteries died in the camera. I am charging the batteries now so I can get some other pics later today. I took out the egg shells of the hatched chicks and it looks like the black chick is RIR/black Australorp. I noticed that 2 more of the Phoenix eggs have pips in them so there should be a couple more out today. This is so COOL.......

Jayare