Broody so soon?

[Kluckners]

Our BLR Wyandotte started laying a couple weeks ago at about 22 weeks. She’s laid a perfect egg every day since.

Yesterday, I noticed she was in the nesting box for quite a long time. As I approached, she yelled at me. I gave her another couple hours and then decided to remove her from the nest. She didn’t complain too much, and went about her business like normal the rest of the day. She’d been sitting on the egg she laid that day and a ceramic egg.

Today, she did the same thing. I removed her without much fuss, other than squawking at me a bit

Is it unusual to go broody so soon and/or this time of year?

 

[MarkJr]

Some of mine display broody type behavior for an hour after the deed as they lounge in their privacy.
If she doesn’t return to box right away, and doesn’t set overnight, I’d chalk it up to her being a lounger. But by all means keep an eye on her.

 

[aart]

Is it unusual to go broody so soon and/or this time of year?

Not too common, but not unheard of.
I'd leave her on the nest until roost time, she may just be a 'lounger'.
If she's still on the nest at dark, put her on the roost.

Here's my go-to signs on a broody:
Is she on nest most the day and all night?
When you pull her out of nest and put her on the ground, does she flatten right back out into a fluffy screeching pancake?
Does she walk around making a low cluckcluckcluckcluckcluck(ticking bomb) sound on her way back to the nest?

If so, then she is probably broody and you'll have to decide how to manage it.

 

[Kluckners]

If she's a lounger, should I just leave her? Both times I've taken her out of the nest with no problem, she didn't even bite/peck at me, just whined/squawked a bit. She doesn't try to go back in when I take her out.

 

[MarkJr]

If you have plenty of boxes, I wouldn’t worry too much about it.

 

[aart]

If she's a lounger, should I just leave her?

That's what I do...have had a few that spent time before and after laying just lounging in the nest. I'd rather let them lounge than interrupt their laying needs, especially a relatively new layer.

 

[Znarf]

Sounds exactly like one of my three hens. One of them started laying perfect eggs around 22 weeks and became broody a couple weeks later. She has now been broody for over three weeks. At first I let her be but now I remove her from the nest box every day and close the access because she is getting too skinny.
At night I manually move her to the roost.

I'll give her a few more days before I'm going to move her to a cage to cool down.