has anyone ever tried this? it's more of a curiosity question than anything else. watching my 15 chicks grow, i'm starting to wonder if it's possible. and if so how many can a normal sized (5-7 lb) hen brood?I have a small game hen (4-5 lbs) that has successively raised 12 normal (mutt) chicks at once. at 2.5 weeks old no more than 2 of the cx would fit under her if she tried covering them. just wondering if anyone has ever tried to let a broody have a few and how it turned out.
Somewhere on byc there is a thread about somebody who gave a broody they had a bunch of cornish X chicks, like 25. Think they were mainly trying to see if it would make the chicks move more and forage and eat more like regular chicks as they followed the hen around. They had pictures of the hen with all these big white chicks sticking out all over, and running around an orchard in the long grass. I think they had a supplemental heat source that would keep warm the chicks the hen couldn't cover, but not sure. For the life of me, I can't remember the name of the thread but it did seem to work.