Chicken breeding, how long are the eggs fertile?

[blucoondawg]

If I were to put a roo together with a group of hens in order to fertalize the eggs for hatch, how long are the hens going to lay fertile eggs? For example if I put them together for 3 days, when will the eggs begin to be fertile and for how many days will they remain fertile after the roo is removed from the hens?

 

[Herducks]

From what i have read it is 10-14 days ussualy

 

[donrae]

Put the roo in on sunday, Monday's egg might not be fertile. Tuesday's egg will be. Hens are said to be able to store sperm from a single mating for up to two weeks. So, how many hens do you have and how many eggs are you wanting to incubate? Leave the roo in with three hens for three days and you could collect eggs for the week, so you'd have around fifteen eggs, going with an average of five eggs a week per hen and only collecting for a week.

 

[Fred's Hens]

But..... this supposes that the rooster is immediately accepted by all the hens and that the rooster mates successfully with all the hens. It rarely happens that quickly and that wide spread throughout the flock. I'd give that rooster much more than just three days. It'll take him some time to make his rounds. Even then, there may be some infertile eggs as some hens are somewhat hesitant and may reject him. If 80% of the eggs are fertile, that'd be considered a success.

 

[saladin]

But..... this supposes that the rooster is immediately accepted by all the hens and that the rooster mates successfully with all the hens. It rarely happens that quickly and that wide spread throughout the flock. I'd give that rooster much more than just three days. It'll take him some time to make his rounds. Even then, there may be some infertile eggs as some hens are somewhat hesitant and may reject him. If 80% of the eggs are fertile, that'd be considered a success.

Indeed there are lots of variables as Fred says.

Sometimes you have to wait a couple of weeks to get fertile eggs because it also depends on the cock/rooster (I don't know what a 'roo' is).

It can help to pull feathers around the vent of both the cock and hen.
Cocks also get lazy. If you'll put him in with the hens for a week and then take him out for a few days, then returning him, you'll generally find the fertility is better than if you leave him in all the time.

Once the hens are giving fertile eggs you can generally expect them to remain fertile for 30 days.

 

[omaeve]

If I were to put a roo together with a group of hens in order to fertalize the eggs for hatch, how long are the hens going to lay fertile eggs? For example if I put them together for 3 days, when will the eggs begin to be fertile and for how many days will they remain fertile after the roo is removed from the hens?

this is a grat ????? I just have had my first pullet lay eggs for a week and was suprised how hard it was for me to crack her eggs to cook. she was raised with the roo and other pullet. My first chicks, so how long do you wait before settiing a new egg layer?