Hi all - I need a bit of advice about chickens raising peachicks...
Our peahen is a bit wayward and shows very little interest in either laying or incubating her own eggs. However occasionally we find eggs around the garden. Recently one of our tiny escape artist hens was found in the garden brooding a nest of about 14 chicken eggs of assorted sizes and a peahen egg! We candled them and took away infertile chicken eggs. Then because she was in the wild and we wouldn't know when the chicken eggs would hatch, we put the peahen egg in the incubator. She hatched her eggs last week and the peachick hatched in the incubator last night. We have another broody hen who we had put quail eggs under, but I've just taken the decision to swap them out and put them in the incubator and put the peachick under the hen, because I feel that raising it alone in a brooder for so long will be hard on it, whereas there will be plenty of quails, and they're independent much faster.
My question is about how long peachicks need mothering. This particular hen is one to abandon her chicks quite early - at around 5-6 weeks, regardless of size. Will this be enough for the peachick? Can we put it in the chicken run with all the others at that point? I'd really love to raise it indoors and have a tame one, but we don't have a decent sized brooder and as it's only one, I think it would be very lonely. Also we're going away and will have house-sitters who may not be as attentive as us! Do any of you have any experience with hens raising peachicks?
Thank you!!!
Amy
Our peahen is a bit wayward and shows very little interest in either laying or incubating her own eggs. However occasionally we find eggs around the garden. Recently one of our tiny escape artist hens was found in the garden brooding a nest of about 14 chicken eggs of assorted sizes and a peahen egg! We candled them and took away infertile chicken eggs. Then because she was in the wild and we wouldn't know when the chicken eggs would hatch, we put the peahen egg in the incubator. She hatched her eggs last week and the peachick hatched in the incubator last night. We have another broody hen who we had put quail eggs under, but I've just taken the decision to swap them out and put them in the incubator and put the peachick under the hen, because I feel that raising it alone in a brooder for so long will be hard on it, whereas there will be plenty of quails, and they're independent much faster.
My question is about how long peachicks need mothering. This particular hen is one to abandon her chicks quite early - at around 5-6 weeks, regardless of size. Will this be enough for the peachick? Can we put it in the chicken run with all the others at that point? I'd really love to raise it indoors and have a tame one, but we don't have a decent sized brooder and as it's only one, I think it would be very lonely. Also we're going away and will have house-sitters who may not be as attentive as us! Do any of you have any experience with hens raising peachicks?
Thank you!!!
Amy
