Chickens mating questions

[Magicalflowers]

So I have five 6 month old chickens. One of them is a rooster name Wisp. I also have a hen named Unie. Multiple times we have seen Wisp try to mate with Unie. And we have seen him get on top of her. When he goes behind her, Unie ducks down like he is about to get on her. I just was wondering what to do and my main questions are:

-How do you know if the eggs are fertilized?
-How many times will they mate until the hens eggs will be fertilized?
-What if we don’t know if it’s fertilized, can you eat the eggs?
-Can a rooster get successfully mate with more than one hen?

 

[Lacy Duckwing]

Smaller roosters can fertilize more hens successfully than a bigger rooster a big rooster 8 hens good. Whereas a small rooster maybe 18 hens. Average size rooster would probably be 12 hens. My Silkie mix rooster was able to successfully fertilize a hen for 5 eggs in a row of a flock of hen of 10. I placed those 5 under a bantam hen and all 5 hatched.
I eat fertilized eggs all the time, by roosters like to keep busy.
Best bet of knowing if the eggs are fertilized is hatch them.
If you have multiple roosters doing the job, the hen will pick whose sperm she wants.
As far as I know it takes once successfully to be fertilized even though the rooster will probably do it more than once in their favorites.
Does all this answer your question?

 

[Melky]

You candle the eggs to check if fertilized. Unknown how many times it takes. It can take up to several days or about two-three weeks to lay fertilized egg once mated. You can eat the eggs if appears ok. You will know when you open it. Yes rooster can mate with more than one hen and is said can mate up to 10-30 x day according to University of Georgia.

 

[Helloworld]

-How do you know if the eggs are fertilized?

If you have a rooster with them, they will be.

-How many times will they mate until the hens eggs will be fertilized?

As much as he wants until you make him stop. We keep ours separated because there are a lot folks who become turned off by blood spot in yolk and won’t buy them. If you keep together, learn how to keep his spurs trimmed and do continual check under wings on back for damge from him. Wings hide a lot of damage. I learned this the hard way. One of my first chickens was a beautiful Golden Brahma. She was easy going and roo loved her too. I did not realize how much until I lifted a wing and saw gangrene. She ate, never complained and carried on. I only had 5 hens with him so it was my fault. We doubled it but found when roos are separate from hens there is less aggression towards me. When it is time to breed, we place a roo for a week in our set of 8 hens. He is then removed if he has been breeding consistently if not he might get a few more days and then he goes back to the bachelor pad. The hens are our queens.

— what if it is fertilized can we eat the eggs?
You can cook like it is and have extra protein... sorry, lol really no pun intended there.. or you can take a fork and remove germ sac off of yolk.

--Can a rooster get successfully mate with more than one hen?

- yes and your leg for practice. Lol

 

[Magicalflowers]

Smaller roosters can fertilize more hens successfully than a bigger rooster a big rooster 8 hens good. Whereas a small rooster maybe 18 hens. Average size rooster would probably be 12 hens. My Silkie mix rooster was able to successfully fertilize a hen for 5 eggs in a row of a flock of hen of 10. I placed those 5 under a bantam hen and all 5 hatched.
I eat fertilized eggs all the time, by roosters like to keep busy.
Best bet of knowing if the eggs are fertilized is hatch them.
If you have multiple roosters doing the job, the hen will pick whose sperm she wants.
As far as I know it takes once successfully to be fertilized even though the rooster will probably do it more than once in their favorites.
Does all this answer your question?

Yes thank you. And Wisp is a kind of big silkie so I suspect he will definitely get the eggs fertilized

 

[The Moonshiner]

To check if fertile you can incubate and candle or open egg and look for bullseye.

They can be fertile after one mating. Of course more mating would ensure fertility.

There's no difference in fertile and non fertile eggs when it comes to eating them.
Some people but crazy ideas in their heads about it but guaranteed you could never tell the difference.

Yes a rooster can and will mate with more then one hen.

As to how many hens and size of rooster. None of that matters. It all depends on the roosters sex drive how many hens he can successfully cover.

Hens can evacuate sperm but they don't pick and choose who's sperm they want to be fertilized by when penned with multiple roosters.

Eggs can be fertile a day or two after mating. They can continue to be fertile up to 2 or 3 weeks after breeding if not rebred.

As to what to do. Do nothing. Chickens don't need any help from us to figure it out and be successful.
Don't stare at them while mating its not polite.

 

[Pork Pie]

Hi and welcome to BYC. These links on fertile eggs maybe helpful -

http://cdn.backyardchickens.com/7/76/500x1000px-LL-767d5e96_EggFertility.jpeg
http://www.backyardchickens.com/t/16008/how-to-tell-a-fertile-vs-infertile-egg-pictures

 

[aart]

You candle the eggs to check if fertilized.

Only after being incubated for at least 3 days.

We keep ours separated because there are a lot folks who become turned off by blood spot in yolk and won’t buy them.

Blood spots have nothing to do with fertilization and are not usually on the yolk but suspended in the albumen.
Blood spots happen when an ova(yolk) is released from the ovary and a small blood vessel breaks.

You can cook like it is and have extra protein... or you can take a fork and remove germ sac off of yolk

There is no 'extra protein' in a fertilized egg...and good luck removing a blastoderm from a yolk.

Here is a great video about egg formation that might help explain some things:

 

[Magicalflowers]

So I have one more question- When they mate does it make only one fertilized egg? Or could one 'mate' I guess make two chicks? How many sperm would be released at one time? As in, how many eggs that the hen lays would be fertilized? Thanks!

 

[The Moonshiner]

So I have one more question- When they mate does it make only one fertilized egg? Or could one 'mate' I guess make two chicks? How many sperm would be released at one time? As in, how many eggs that the hen lays would be fertilized? Thanks!

Most say one mating may fertilize 3 weeks worth of eggs.
I've found after about 2 weeks I didn't get many that were fertile. Then of course there's the idea that eggs over 10 days old don't have much chance to hatch.
Of course it would really depend on the individual chickens involved so you could round it to from 10 to 21 days worth.
Mother nature made it that way so if a hen is breeding she could then go off and lay a clutch then hatch them without having to run around to find the male and breed everyday.
I've done the rooster with hen one day out of every seven and had good results.