Broody Hen Thread!

[DinaKay]

We have had them as young as 6.5 months, if your young hen has been laying for a few weeks it is possible. Generally I have seen broody prone pullets lay for a few weeks then go broody, whether they begin laying at 18 weeks or 22 weeks doesn't seem to matter, once the hormones get going they work on their own time frame.

Yes she's been laying since January..she's out of my first hatch..next question lol. Are those young hens eggs viable to hatch? I have A RIR roo who's takes care of his girls..you know what I mean

. They're just small eggs.

 

[Dani4Hedgies]

I have a slightly off topic newbie question when you're broody hens hatch a clutch how or do you vaccine the new chicks against Mareks/Newcastles ect. I know about the medicated feed as I feed that but how do you do the other vaccines? Thanks

 

[fisherlady]

Yes she's been laying since January..she's out of my first hatch..next question lol. Are those young hens eggs viable to hatch? I have A RIR roo who's takes care of his girls..you know what I mean

. They're just small eggs.

General wisdom is that pullet eggs are more prone to hatching/development problems, But if you choose the larger of the eggs with good shapes and make sure they aren't porous and have decent air cells then they should do OK

I have a slightly off topic newbie question when you're broody hens hatch a clutch how or do you vaccine the new chicks against Mareks/Newcastles ect. I know about the medicated feed as I feed that but how do you do the other vaccines? Thanks

We don't vaccinate for anything or use medicated food here, so can't give you direction other than try the search function for 'vaccinating my flock' or something similar. It seems that our birds have developed pretty strong immune systems by feeding from the ground right from the start, they've been exposed to whatever pathogens are in our soils in small amounts from day one...if you have any known illnesses in your flock though it may not work as well at your property.

 

[Puddin Fluff]

Yes she's been laying since January..she's out of my first hatch..next question lol. Are those young hens eggs viable to hatch? I have A RIR roo who's takes care of his girls..you know what I mean

. They're just small eggs.

I have always heard that pullet eggs are not the best to hatch. I think it is due to the smaller size there is less room for the embryo and more of a chance that they might have problems. Maybe someone else will chime in who has tried it.

 

[Puddin Fluff]

General wisdom is that pullet eggs are more prone to hatching/development problems, But if you choose the larger of the eggs with good shapes and make sure they aren't porous and have decent air cells then they should do OK

We don't vaccinate for anything or use medicated food here, so can't give you direction other than try the search function for 'vaccinating my flock' or something similar. It seems that our birds have developed pretty strong immune systems by feeding from the ground right from the start, they've been exposed to whatever pathogens are in our soils in small amounts from day one...if you have any known illnesses in your flock though it may not work as well at your property.

We do not vaccinate either. We do, however, practice good bio-security to try to keep anything unwanted from coming in. We only have birds for ourselves, we don't sell commercially so that might make a difference for some.

 

[Honora]

I have a slightly off topic newbie question when you're broody hens hatch a clutch how or do you vaccine the new chicks against Mareks/Newcastles ect. I know about the medicated feed as I feed that but how do you do the other vaccines? Thanks

I just went to a workshop on biosecurity, and the presenter said you can buy the Marek's vaccine at feed stores. He said it has to be given to the chicks at 1 day of age, otherwise it is ineffective. He said there is no commercially available vaccine for Newcastle.

I plan on giving the Marek's vaccine when my chicks hatch this time.

 

[Dani4Hedgies]

I just went to a workshop on biosecurity, and the presenter said you can buy the Marek's vaccine at feed stores.  He said it has to be given to the chicks at 1 day of age, otherwise it is ineffective. He said there is no commercially available vaccine for Newcastle. 

I plan on giving the Marek's vaccine when my chicks hatch this time. 

Great thank you

 

[JaeG]

Technically this is not a broody hen but she might as well be. I had got hatching eggs off a lovely lady but my one precious d'uccle egg didn't hatch as it had a tiny crack in it I hadn't noticed so it stopped development at about day 15 (it's the end of the season here in New Zealand so I was pretty gutted). This lady found me a little approximately 12 week old d'uccle pullet in her free range flock and offered her to me. We don't have good d'uccle stock in New Zealand (certainly not the gorgeous colours you have in America) but they are still a sweet little bantam - I'm hoping she will get a big of facial fluff as she just has sparse whiskers at the moment. My daughter wanted a frizzle pekin bantam (cochin) so we bought two chicks off this lady as well - a 1 week old and a 2 week old. She boxed them up together and we brought them home.

The chicks were cuddled up with the pullet when we got them home so I put them in an indoor cage together and gave them a heat lamp. We called the d'uccle Hope and she has seriously adopted these two frizzle chicks as her own, and they look to her as their mother 100%. Hope will let them cuddle with her to keep warm, she shows them food, she even rushed one of our cats when it got too close to their cage (our cats aren't interested in the chicks, they are just jealous of the attention the chicks get). And for a chicken that was free ranging, Hope is very docile and sweet.

I had read that older chicks hatched in an incubator (as these 2 were) won't recognise another chicken as their mother so I had a brooder all set up for them rather than trying to attach them to one of my broody hens (which I had thought about doing before I did some research). But now Hope is looking after them and I don't have to worry. Makes my life easier that's for sure!


From left to right, Hope, Cracker (who is VERY cuddly), and Avalanche

 

[poodlechicks]

I just went to a workshop on biosecurity, and the presenter said you can buy the Marek's vaccine at feed stores. He said it has to be given to the chicks at 1 day of age, otherwise it is ineffective. He said there is no commercially available vaccine for Newcastle.

I plan on giving the Marek's vaccine when my chicks hatch this time.

I think I saw NC vaccine at Jeffers pet's website. It's not expensive, but a lot of it is wasted unless you have 1,000 + birds or have a lot of people w/ birds to share the extra doses.

 

[poodlechicks]

JaeG, they are adorable!