can I add more poults to a hen with her own?

[jasonm11]

I have two hens sitting on eggs that should hatch in the next 3 weeks. I plan on letting the hens raise the poults. I wanted to purchase some Br and BBW poults and thought about adding them to the hen's group. Will she accept them? Or will she Kill them?

 

[Thomasturkey]

I am sure there is people who would tell you their turkeys raised kittens, hamsters and goldfish. I have never had these special turkey moms. My experience have not had these type of happy endings. My turkeys will not raise anything that they did not hatch themselves. They also will not raise anything except poults. One peck and the poult is severely injured or dead.
I have had chickens hatch poults too but I have always had to take them away before they found out they where not chickens.

 

[kuntrygirl]

Quote:

I have never had these special moms either, with the exception of 1 time when a chicken accidentally layed an egg in the turkey's nest and the turkey raised the baby chick. I have hens now that don't want to raise their own poults, let alone another hen's poults.

They could care less about what just hatched, which is why I have to take all of the poults away. However, I do have chickens that will raise poults as their own.

Maybe someone will come along who has had good experiences with this.

 

[jasonm11]

okay, in that case how hard is it to raise poults in North TX? I have a large covered run and the temps staying nice. I have a heat lamp I can put in the shed for them. Will tehy be okay by themselves or should I leave them with the hens and forget about getting extra poults?

 

[Steve_of_sandspoultry]

deleted

 

[Thomasturkey]

I have raised a lot of poults so here is my pitch for brooding poults. I have not found them to be any stronger if they are raised with the mom in my experience. If poults are kept clean and do not sit and smell ammonia, are at the right temperature until they develop a immune system, they stay healthy and strong. Moms can raise poults in filth too. The main difference is the poults raised with lots of human contact are much easier to be around. I am not talking about throwing them in a shed or garage. I raise mine in my house. Yes it is more work and my electric bill is high. But I think they are better for it. As adults egg collection is easy. I never have a problem catching anyone. Nobody is ever mean or wild.

 

[jimmythechicken]

we had a hen take in one of our baby lions an raise it as her own they now live in the same pen with no problems.

 

[Steve_of_sandspoultry]

deleted

 

[Breac]

As long as you add the poults within the first few days of hatching, there's a chance she'll take them. I gave an extra poult to my broody hen last year after she hatched three of her own. She adopted it as her own, and I imagine that if the feral cats hadn't gotten to it, it would've grown up just fine.