Regaj
Chirping
I've raised a very small flock of White Leghorns for four years now. Presently I have three hens and a rooster. They live in a 4x6 coop with six nest boxes. They don't have a run, per se, but I have two connected 168' lengths of Premier One electric fencing that encloses their domain. So they have a pretty decent piece of land to call their own - around 7,000 square feet, with several large trees, bushes, and regular grass inside that area.
One of the hens has gone broody. First time that's happened with any of my girls.
My original batch of six chicks, picked up from the post office when they were just a couple days old, spent their first month in a large box in my living room. So I'm very familiar that method of raising chicks, gently easing them into their larger outdoor adventures.
Now, with a hen sitting on a couple of eggs in a nest box inside the coop, I'm debating how that "natural" method might work, if I let her bring them to hatch.
I could, of course, intervene when they hatch, and take on all the new-chick duties like I did with my original chicks. But I'd like to know if it's possible to let momma do all that nurturing.
I don't really have a great way to isolate either momma or the chicks-to-be, so I'm wondering how that situation might work - chicks suddenly appearing in the midst of other adult chickens? Would they hurt the chicks? Would momma continue to stay down on the floor of the coop with them until they're old enough to jump up on the roosts? Is this even a way to get new chicks started?
Sorry for what probably seem like dumb questions!
One of the hens has gone broody. First time that's happened with any of my girls.
My original batch of six chicks, picked up from the post office when they were just a couple days old, spent their first month in a large box in my living room. So I'm very familiar that method of raising chicks, gently easing them into their larger outdoor adventures.
Now, with a hen sitting on a couple of eggs in a nest box inside the coop, I'm debating how that "natural" method might work, if I let her bring them to hatch.
I could, of course, intervene when they hatch, and take on all the new-chick duties like I did with my original chicks. But I'd like to know if it's possible to let momma do all that nurturing.
I don't really have a great way to isolate either momma or the chicks-to-be, so I'm wondering how that situation might work - chicks suddenly appearing in the midst of other adult chickens? Would they hurt the chicks? Would momma continue to stay down on the floor of the coop with them until they're old enough to jump up on the roosts? Is this even a way to get new chicks started?
Sorry for what probably seem like dumb questions!