Can you induce broodiness?

[joebryant]

This usually works:
Stick the hen in a fairly large box (DARK INSIDE) with a nest, food, and water for one to seven days.

 

[estpr13]

I agree with Joe B. Make the box about 3 foot square with a nest box inside. This allows her to get off the nest box and eat, drink and poop off the nest. It also keeps other hens from donating eggs when and if she goes broody. It will also serve as a brooder for the first week.

I've had a hen go broody at about 8 months of age and others at over two years. I don't know what conditions trigger broodiness but something happened with my flock about the first of August when I had the first of 6 of my 18 hens start to go broody with four of them finally getting serious and hatching out chicks. One other one is still on a nest after about four weeks. Prior to this episode I would only have perhaps one hen per year try to go broody.
i
I think one thing which helped is that once I found a hen trying to go broody, I would move her and her eggs into a private nest and lock her in for a day or two. I would then remove the barrier to her nest an allow her the option of getting off or not. Usually she would stay put. One hen I had to catch and block her into the nest twice before she stayed, but that had something to do with the newly hatched chicks of another hen who didn't want her in the same brooder area. She hatched out three of seven eggs.

Good luck,

edited to say; Perhaps nothing out of the ordinary has happened to my hens. Perhaps it is just that I am more observant in watching them, or understanding what I am seeing, then taking action to help them with their broodiness. Other hens will peck a hen trying to be broody off a nest so that she can lay an egg. So by seperating the broody from the other bossy hens, the hen's broody tendancy can fully develop.

 

[GwenDellAnno]

Just so you know... I tried the box thing and it didn't work. I finally let her back out and she happily continued laying eggs for me.

 

[Judy]

My BO's have never gone broody, but I have a persistently broody EE and an Australorp or two who go broody every few months. I have 14 hens and one always seems to be broody. Since they just started laying, a little patience just might get you a mama.

 

[Lollipop]

Quote:
I agee, and with Joe also. My experience is with various bantams, Spanish Games, and various oriental games, but none of the larger barnyard types. I have been able to persuade hens to set by leaving eggs in their nests. Being gamefowl, for the most part, all of my breeders have been single mated, i.e. one hen to one rooster. Once the hen is broody, I move her to a maternity pen that is roughly 30" X 30". After it is determined that she will remain on the nest and not desert it after the move, I remove the nest eggs and replce them with a fresh clutch that I want her to hatch. Then she remains there until the chicks are about 2 weeks old and I move them to a larger 4' X 5' pen with a dirt floor. I learned to do all this over almost 53 years with fowl. Dunno if your barnyard types will respond the same, but bantams and games are likely........Pop

 

[Chickenaddict]

I agree with Joe B and Pop I have had lots of luck getting my bantams to sit on eggs by just letting the eggs accumulate in the nest. Even when I don't want them hatching they go nuts and sit on air for weeks on end despite my efforts. Like now I have 4 hens one has been sitting on nothing for over 2 months now. Not even a wire bottom cage for 1 week will break that girl! If ya were closer I'd borrow ya one of my broody hens

 

[cat1994]

i didnt have luck with the box thing, but i hear that marans are very broody.

Hope it works out

 

[hallerlake]

I'm thinking ahead to next spring. I don't have a rooster, but I can get some interesting eggs from people in my area. I don't know what my husband would say to getting an incubator. He'd rather this new hobby of mine didn't cost any more money than it has to. How do the hatch rates under a hen compare to in an incubator?

 

[Barred Rocks forever]

Quote:
eegs under a good broody hatch well get some silkys they love going broody

 

[Lisa Harmon]

I just read that prolactin is the hormone responsible for broodiness in turkeys. I wonder if there is a way to increase or inject prolactin in a chicken hen we want to brood?