Broody Hen Thread!

[shadypineschooks]

I'll bet!! How do the eggs look?

We're new to hatching so we looked at the post here with the series of eggs candled day by day. We candled Friday night and took out three, two clears and a blood ring. Nine left, all looked good, although a few are really dark and hard to get a good look at. We left those in. So we'll see

 

[aart]

although a few are really dark and hard to get a good look at.

Dark shells?
Did the air cell size look good?

They are probably out there internally pipping right now!
You may be able to hear mamas vocalizations changing once that happens.
Hard to sit tight and wait, but it's best.

 

[shadypineschooks]

Dark shells?
Did the air cell size look good?
...
Hard to sit tight and wait, but it's best.

Air cells were good (I'm pretty sure ). The shells are dark brown on some of the eggs, some are white or blue or just light brown, and were easier to see. We candled with a military flashlight but we are newbies and trying to manage both hens while candling. We rechecked the four we had taken out and saw one was definitely good and returned it to the girls. The others we saw no signs of an embryo.

We were thinking to candle again tomorrow night (one week from due date). Should we skip that and leave the eggs be?

 

[aart]

We were thinking to candle again tomorrow night (one week from due date). Should we skip that and leave the eggs be?

You could...or just wait to see what hatches.
I candle at day 7-10-14 and 18 when using an incubator to adjust humidity,
but with broodies I only candle at about day 10 to 14 to remove any duds.

 

[shadypineschooks]

I'll bet!! How do the eggs look?

We candled the eggs on our broody sisters again last night. This time I dug up my Brinsea candler and we used that instead of a flashlight (big improvement!) We also moved all the eggs at once, candled as quickly as possible, then returned them. One girl had five and the other had four, so interesting.

We lost one we could see the blood and it was far less developed, but all the rest have good veins and movement. Most of the air cells look good, except for one, the air cell is on the side rather than the fat end.

We returned the eggs 4 per hen. We're going to leave them alone now that we got a good look at them and wait for the finish line!

 

[aart]

Most of the air cells look good, except for one, the air cell is on the side rather than the fat end.

I've had a few of these, some hatched fine.

 

[shadypineschooks]

Update: One of our broodies mysteriously left the nest at day 18 so our other broody took over. We had 7 of 9 eggs hatch, one quit and one was cracked (probably stepped on). The chicks are adorable and Millie is a great broody mama!

 

[Perris]

 

[fisherlady]

So I haven't been around much lately, mostly I've been over on the Old Fashioned Broody thread, but my Hubby has been nice enough to get some videos of the latest hen hijinks and upload them to YouTube for me so I thought I would share.
We had a group of 6 Silver Pencil Rock hens go broody, most within a week of each other but one a bit later,though she was still good to go when given chicks.

Since they all were content to sit together we decided to move them together to a new pen after they had spent a night with a new hatched chick under them to aid their transition from sitting mode to mama mode. I went out Friday morning and moved them all to the floor boxes in the neighboring pen. And they all were content to click away to their new chicks. Once I was sure they were settled we gVe them the rest of their chicks. They were given 3 each but the chicks and hens dont seem to care which belongs to who. Chicks have 6 hens, no waiting when they want fed or warmed!

 

[fisherlady]

A few more videos ... the hens really seem content to share duties.

And when hubby was messing around in the coop swapping out their 3 boxes for a mega broody box the hens didnt like the fussing so they 'circled the wagons' so to speak and opted to stick together with all the chicks in the middle and under them.