Broody Madness

[tori852]

Hey Backyard Chickens folks, it's been awhile since I posted here, lol. So here's the situation: we have our first flock of 8 chickens that we raised, 7 hens and one roo. One of our seven hens went broody last month. After a week of trying to get her to stop, we gave up and let her brood in the coop nest box of her choice. We set up a wire dog crate connected to the box with food and water so she couldn't sit on the wrong nests and the other's wouldn't disturb her. I attached a pic below. We gave her eggs, she was a diligent broody, four of the eight eggs ended up viable, and they're in the process of hatching right now. We're going to keep the mommy and her chicks in their nest box dog crate set up for a few days and then let them free range with the rest of the flock. What's your experience with free ranging chicks? We understand there's a risk factor but it'd be so much more enjoyable for the flock.

Anyway, in the last week, another hen decided she was going to go broody too. Showing all the signs of broodiness, and definitely determined. And in the last three days, two MORE hens have decided to go broody! Now we only have 3 hens laying!!! Why did they all decide to do this at the same time??? I do not understand them. Here are our crazy broody birds.

So, here's the complicated part, we have an order of day old chicks we're picking up from an Icelandic chicken breeder this Saturday. 24 of em. We set up this order a few months ago, and they're from a different line so they're much more desirable to the future genetics of the flock than any hatchlings from our current stock would be. We do not want to let our hens hatch more eggs, we wouldn't have space and we don't need more baby chickens.

My question: can I just give some of these new chicks to each of the broody hens as adopted babies? How do I go about doing that? If the broodies take to them, I'd keep each broody and her babies separated but in view for the first few days of course, and then let them free range as a flock. Would that work? But is having four mommy hens with their chicks all free ranging together just begging for a fight? I've done a fair amount of research, and it seems that for most, having multiple broodies together seems to work alright, especially if they have ample space. But then I hear that the broody hens could fight for custody and hurt the babies which is obviously not what we want, especially since these are ordered chicks that we've invested in (there and back it's a four hour drive to the breeder). Thoughts?

Though we can brood the chicks ourselves inside, we'd prefer to let the hens raise them because we may as well, it's more natural, its less work for us, we wouldn't have to try to break three broodies, and we wouldn't have to figure out introducing 24 birds to the existing flock when they're older. And it's wonderful to watch the hens raise their own babies.

So what do you think? Any advice is helpful, thank you so much!!!

PS sorry for writing so much, I like to be thorough

 

[tootmany]

Wanted to say your hens look lovely! I've heard the best route is to pop the chicks under the broody at night when they are sleeping, but have not done it myself. I hope you keep us updated on how it goes! Best of luck

 

[Life is Good!]

Our flock tends to all go broody simultaneously also...it's hard to manage, but you can make it work. Last spring, we had 8 hens go broody together - with 9 nesting boxes! So it became a challenge to figure out which eggs were the ones where...then I found one hen stealing eggs from the nest box next door (so she had 11 eggs instead of 5!)....ARGH!

The only way I found to manage this many broodies is to seperate them - two together with their chicks seem ok, but not three family units. So we built a broody house (small coopette without nesting boxes), a PVC tractor with locking door (for the most aggressive Mom and chicks), a dog-house crate (like what you've done already), their original small coop (6'x10' -holds 12 chickens well) and their large coop (holds 24 chickens well). That was the only way I got this many broodies and chicks to survive. I moved the entire flock into the small coop - and let the broodies have the large coop. Once the chicks started to hatch, the Moms and chicks were moved to other spaces (dog-house coop, coopette, etc.) I had so many waterers and feeders to keep track of - it was a lot of work!

Yes, we lost chicks to aggressive Moms (hence the locking door on the PVC tractor - I moved it into the middle of our 2 acre lot to get her away from other Moms!). Yes, we nearly lost chicks because they wriggled out of where they should have been but son with great dog found chick hiding in the grass!

Yes, I've successfully grafted chicks to broodies - yes, I've lost chicks this way too. Depends on the Momma. I have found it works best with day old or younger, after 2 days, the chicks don't seem to recognize Mom's voice. That initial imprint is so critical! Yes, I went in after dark without a light, slipped a hand beneath Mom to lift here slightly so she was standing, slipped a chick or two or three under and pulled the eggs out. Mom wriggles down onto chicks who cheep and peep and are answered by one another. It's wonderful and beautiful and amazing when it works! But awful the next morning if another hen is defensive of the coop from these 'intruders' and kills chicks or hurts Mom.....ugh. Chickens!

For your 24 new chicks. They are already a flock. I would keep them that way. With a broody, the chicks will not graft to you or be as close to you as with you raising them. Just the way it is! And yes, my broody Mom's take their chicks outside at 3 days old. Very, very cute - very, very hard to keep their fencing and gates secure enough so the little ones don't clamber through! I'm glad I work from home, because I can open windows to hear the little ones calling 'help me, I'm on the wrong side of the fence!'. And then go out to rescue them - just for another to do the same 2 min later! Thank goodness for wi-fi that reaches the coop! I found it most productive to simply take my laptop and phone outside and sit on the picnic table!

Good luck! Enjoy your new chicks!

 

[tori852]

Thanks so much for asking, the new chicks are doing great, I picked them up yesterday. 26 of them, the breeder gave us a few extra. They hatched on Wednesday like our four other chicks did. We have a total of 30 chicks now!!! So many little peeping sounds.

Here they are on the way home. They're Icelandic chickens so they don't have a standard color like most breeds. It's pretty much chance what comb style, head feathering, color, and feather pattern they are since they're a mix of the four Icelandic lines. Very interested to see what they will look like when they're bigger.

Some close ups of the different colors. I managed to get some of them to sit still on my knee for picture time. They're just so darn cute!!!

I gave 6 of these new ones to the mama hen (Ash is her name) who hatched her own 4, so she has 10 out of the 30 total chicks now. She didn't seem to notice the extras, clearly she's bad at math. The chicks immediately understood that she was mama, which surprised me. Obviously they have good instincts, and it might've helped that the breeder was using brinsea ecoglows so they understood they needed to go under something to get warmth.

As for the 4 broody hens, 2 of them decided to more or less quit which is good. They go up onto the roosts at night but sit on the nests for a part of the day acting broody. The 2 committed broody hens (Nutmeg and Cloud) are each set up with a dog crate in the coop like I did before, but they have not received chicks yet. I decided not to try it last night because I wanted to make sure they were still committed broody hens and not just copycat copouts like the other two.

I'm going to give just 2 or 3 chicks each to them tonight using the method y'all described. Probably not a necessary precaution, but I'm taking the cautious route because I really REALLY don't want to wake up to 20 dead chicks if the hens decide to reject them. That would be horrible, and they'd freeze to death with these unreasonably cold nights. Mother Nature didn't get the memo that it's supposed to be spring and not winter, we got snow yesterday.

So, if in the morning Nutmeg and Cloud have not rejected the chicks and they're all doing fine, then I'll hand the remaining chicks over. That way each of the three mother hens will have 10 chicks. Based on Ash's behavior, they don't seem to care at all if they're given extras once they're over the initial shock of "BLAH THERE'S A CREATURE UNDERNEATH ME." I guess we'll see.

I'll keep you updated!

And I'm so happy my broody set up was able to help you!!! It was literally just something I improvised with spare stuff I found in the barn since I didn't have the time or energy to build something permanent. But hey, it works.

 

[tori852]

Ok so we introduced the chicks last night like I described. Went fine at night, and they were fine when I checked on them first thing in the morning. Seeing their success, Dad gave Cloud two more in the morning so she had four. Not a good idea.
Once the chicks started waking up, Cloud decided to reject her four. She chased them out of her cage and wouldn't let them come near her. Apparently the chicks can get through the dog crate so note to anyone who might use this method: attach hardware cloth to do the dog crate or SOMETHING to keep the chicks in. Though in our case it was probably good since the chicks were able to escape and thus were uninjured. They were running around the coop though and going between the cages and freaking out.

Luckily Ash (she and her chicks are uncaged and have free roam of the coop) and Nutmeg were dutifully collecting any lost stragglers, though Ash didn't want the black chicks at all and she'd nip at them for some reason. Nutmeg is doing great with her chicks and has no color preference. She immediately switched to mommy mode and is making cute little mommy chicken sounds so we gave her more until she had 12, and we let Ash keep the ones that had run away from Cloud so she has 12 as well. The last 6 chicks are in the brooder inside since we don't have anywhere else to put them.

So it worked!!! Mostly. If I had to do it again, I'm not sure I would recommend trying to graft chicks at 6 days old, I think I should have tried all of this as soon as I brought the new chicks home. The reason is that they tend to wander more for some reason (but that might have to do with the warmer weather so idk) which is why we have Nutmeg secured in a crate for now so her chicks can't run off. I think they'll all settle down alright though and get the hang of it, but I'm not sure the two mommies will be able to share space. Ash is very defensive, she attacks any hen who comes near. We'll see how things go. I'll update y'all again soon.

 

[aart]

I would go for it. I’ve never had a broody hen not accept chicks that where more than a week old.

More than week old......or less?
Maybe I'm missing your point?

We're going to keep the mommy and her chicks in their nest box dog crate set up for a few days and then let them free range with the rest of the flock. What's your experience with free ranging chicks? We understand there's a risk factor but it'd be so much more enjoyable for the flock.

That is one slick set-up!.....did you just leave the back panel folded down?
Now can you repeat it 3 more times?

Not sure about the multiple broodies accepting chicks and living harmoniously,
but sure want to follow along for the ride.
Might work out great, might need a backup plan ready to go.
Best of cLuck!

 

[aart]

You'll still need more crates for them...haha!
Crate City Coop at your place!!

My experience went like this: After her setting for 3 days and nights in the nest, I put her in a wire dog crate with smaller wire on the bottom but no bedding, set up on a couple of 4x4's right in the coop with fed and water

I let her out a couple times a day(you don't have to) and she would go out into the run, drop a huge turd, race around running, take a vigorous dust bath then head back to the nest... at which point I put her back in the crate. Each time her outings would lengthen a bit, eating, drinking and scratching more and on the 3rd afternoon she stayed out of the nest and went to roost that evening...event over, back to normal tho she didn't lay for another week or two. Or take her out of crate daily very near roosting time(30-60 mins) if she goes to roost great, if she goes to nest put her back in crate.

Feed and water added after pic was taken.

 

[Life is Good!]

So how are your new chicks?! Photos?! I do hope they are as cute as can be!
Any update on what you decided about where the new chicks would be? With broodies or with one another? I'm always interested to learn other folks' success and to see what works for them. (That's the beauty of these forums...education is powerful!)
I really liked your 'solution' with the dog-house crate wrapped around the nesting box. That is ingenious and will be used by many, many folks here! Including me likely this spring!

 

[tori852]

"Demon Momma" is a good way to put it. But she keeps trying to be broody! I got my dad to tell me the rest of the story, apparently the chicks were already running away from her before he added more because she only had one underneath her when he checked in the morning. So she just sucks.

I really like our Icelandics, they're so neat! Not many people have them so I'm glad to help conserve the breed. And I especially love that I get the looks of a mixed flock but they're all the same. I think they're a bit more wild then other breeds though, but it's hard for me to tell since these are our first chickens and I have nothing to compare them too.

Anyway, the mommy chickens and their babies are settling in really well. The chicks bonded great and don't mix the moms up, and the moms are mothering them nicely. It's the cutest thing, I love the noises. We close the coop during the day so the other chickens can't get in and disturb them, and both moms are uncaged. They each picked a half of the coop. Both sides have a feeder, and theres a big waterer in the middle. The moms don't mind the other's chicks getting too close, but they will not tolerate each other. The dominant one, the first broody, beats the other back to her side if she comes closer than is deemed appropriate. But they're coexisting alright. It'll be interesting to see how it goes when they're all released into the run... they're not ready yet though. Our coop is about two feet off the ground and I don't think the little chicks would be able to get up and down the ramp just yet.

And you're 100% right, there's definitely never a dull moment...

 

[Angeline1978]

Hens may not take to other chicks. They may kill them. Most of the time free ranging they will stay with mom. Along with other things in the chicken world, chicks can stray and bad things can happen. Best of luck,soun like you're getting ready to be very busy!