Can you tell which chicken lays which egg?

[WalkingOnSunshine]

We are brand new chicken owners, and got our chicks in early April, so they will start to lay this fall. We have about 30 pullets in a flock of several different breeds. I want to introduce a few roosters.

I want to get some nice roos of breeds that I would like to have more of, now that I've gotten to know them. What I would like to do is let the birds all pasture together, and if I get a broody hen put some eggs under her. But I would only want to hatch the eggs from some chickens. Is what I want to do even possible with a flock our size?

E

 

[jessica117]

Yes and no. You will almost have to coop the chickens you want to collect fertile eggs from unless that particular breed have notable eggs. I am on a much smaller scale with my hen house. I have all my cochins separated by color, but I do let them out for a few hours in the afternoon/evening (after they've deposited their eggs in their respective nests.)

With my hens, I pretty much know which egg comes from who, but I only have 7 hens to keep track of. The EE is the easiest

, but each hen (at least in my mixutre) has it's own tint to the brown, or size that helps me keep them straight.

Jess

 

[Akane]

Do you pen the hens seperately or just keep them locked up in the building until they lay and then figure out who layed where? Do they like to lay on the same nests each time? I have a similar issue. I'd like to have a few different types of bantams with 1 or 2 japanese bantam roosters and the rest hens with probably less than a dozen chickens total. It would be nice to be able to pick out the pure jap eggs compared to the mixed eggs.

 

[jessica117]

With my cochins (who's eggs all basically look the same) I have separate coops for each color. If while collecting eggs you notice that you have color/size differences that you think you could recognize in the future, I'd coop up a hen at a time in a separate cage or coop for a couple days, or until you have an egg. Compare it to the others in the fridge and write down what you see. You might want to do it for a couple eggs each chicken to make sure they lay consistently the same color/size.

If I have a particular hen or hens and roo that I want to mate, I separate them from the rest just to make sure I get the right eggs. You would only have to do it for a couple weeks to get a decent sized clutch.

As far as the same nest thing, my laying hens all fight over one nest box. There are plenty of nesting boxes in the coop but they have one in the corner that is their favorite and they all line up to lay in it. If one hen is taking too long, the next one will force her way in too. It is hilarious to watch 2 full grown hens try to cram into a 12" x 12" nesting box.

Jess

 

[jenjscott]

If I have a particular hen or hens and roo that I want to mate, I separate them from the rest just to make sure I get the right eggs. You would only have to do it for a couple weeks to get a decent sized clutch

But the hen can lay eggs for up to three weeks from a previous roo, thus you would have to wait three weeks before you would know for sure they were offspring from that roo.​

 

[Davaroo]

There are only two ways to determine which individual bird is laying that I know of:

1. Hang out in the coop and watch them all.
This is time consuming for you and undiginified to the chickens. I mean imagine if you had a chicken watching you lay an egg....

2. Use trapnests
Again, these are demanding of your time, in that you have to release the bird and so note which one has used the nest.

You can make your nests one way, so that by leaving they enter a separate holding area. Then at least you know which ones have been using the nests.

All in all, it seems a lot of trouble to go to unless you have a specific reason for knowing.

 

[Akane]

That's why I was only planning 1 type of rooster. I will know what crosses I have and which breed is pure. The problem is only telling eggs apart. Guess I'll just have to hatch them all.

 

[Davaroo]

What most do under your conditons is resort to pen breeding.
You put the birds you want mated in a separate pen and let them go to it for awhile. Then you collect and hatch the eggs from that pen.

 

[jessica117]

Quote:
I had always been told about 3 days, not 3 weeks. I took my black hen out of the black roosters enclosure and put her in with the white roo. After 3 days of taking the eggs i let her make a clutch. All of my chickies turned out white with black spots.... I have bred the black ones together before and always got black.