broody

[cajunlizz]

Besides , I would be praying NOT for hens to go broody in the wintertime . HARD to have baby chicks in the winter months . SO NICE in the spring and summer and they grow ALOT faster too .

 

[chicken+quail=luv]

Quote:
darn! and we're hatching in the spring anyway. my crossbreed has a crooked jaw and probably would NOT be a good ma, b/c she can hardly clean herself, let alone take care of chicks. one peck from her = 2 pecks. my poor chickie!

 

[chicken+quail=luv]

wait, nevermind.........she may not be a rhode island red. she looks like one, though..........she's a reddish color, but has a lot of white, too. i will post pics soon!

 

[Southernbelle]

*chicken+quail=luv* :

wait, nevermind.........she may not be a rhode island red. she looks like one, though..........she's a reddish color, but has a lot of white, too. i will post pics soon!

A sex-link, maybe? Still not a broody type.​

 

[Jster]

I have a red sexlink who went broody after just over a year. She's our alpha chicken. We went out of town for a few days and I think the accumulation of eggs in the nest box encouraged her. But I think yours is probably a little too young to get that urge, unless as others have said she's a breed that's prone to it.

We consider ourselves very fortunate to have had a broody in the first year of chicken ownership, I've heard a lot of people who've been caring for chickens for years and never had one. Unfortunately, our culture bred it out of most breeds, definitely a recessive trait, so even if you try everything it might not work out.

But hey...no problem with trying. In the spring she may be old enough.

Bigger problem though...if your chickens "keep getting eaten" you need a more secure coop/run area. Maybe you should work on that now, rather than risk chicks too?

 

[cajunlizz]

I started my chicken flock back in April of this year . During the summer , I had 2 of my hens go broody . 1 was a back austrolorp and the other was a Lil English game bantam , infact , she went broody twice .

We did end up putting eggs under both of them so they could finally break their broody cycle and we ended up with 6 beautiful chicks from the BA , and 5 under the english game .

BUT , I have concluded in all of this , NO MORE BABY CHICKS for us . We have them strickly for egg production .... feeding and raising baby chicks take to long between hatching and laying , especially with the cost of feed going UP UP UP ....

I ended up giving my last baby chicks that hatched to a friend that wanted to do what we are doing ..... He got hooked on our flock . NOW he has a total of 15 in his small flock , BUT adding weekly .... I warned him they do get habit forming and very addictive .

 

[cmom]

RIR's are generally not broody. Some breeds are more apt to go broody than others. Yes you can try putting some fertilized eggs under your broody. She may brood them and may not. This link will give you info on which breeds tend to be broody. Silkies tend to be great brooders.

http://www.ithaca.edu/staff/jhenderson/chooks/chooks.html

 

[chicken+quail=luv]

Quote:
yeah, we are half way finished our new, awesome coop, with wide bricks on the bottom so nothing can dig under. we got wire fencing, and we are going to make it about, maybe 7 feet high, with a roof. after having some beloved chickens since birth getting eaten, we knew we couldn't let them free range anymore. there are about 3 small trees in it, and some dead logs. plus some roosting perches.

 

[chicken+quail=luv]

i have some pics of her, and i am posting them in 2 secs. she is a golden or red sex link. probably of a red and white rhode island.

 

[chicken+quail=luv]

nevermind....it's raining and she's probably hiding in a bush outside. my chicken HATE rain.