Eggbound, broody or what?

[foweler]

My Light Brahma is behaving strangely. She layed later than normal yesterday and then later in the evening I found her back in the nest, panting her beak off. It was hot in there. It was time for the girls to come in for a bit of AC before bedtime so I grabbed her and brought her in. She sat in the chair with her tail shoved up in the air and all of her feathers fluffed up, making a sneeze-like sound.

I put them all back in the coop for the night but in the morning when it was time to come out the LB was in the nest like she had slept there all night. I walked around to the back door I installed for collecting eggs and opened it. I lifted her a bit to see that there were no eggs. Then I watched her reach out with her beak and slowly shove the golf ball underneath her. I thought "This is ridiculous, she's going to miss breakfast (grapes and yogurt), so I grabbed her and put her by the treat bowl. She sat there, tail up and feathers puffed for a minute and then started eating. A while later she was out scratching in the yard with the others like everything was normal. I just came back home for a minute and checked the nest. No birds and no eggs. I went over to the bush they hide in and when I approached she was tail up and feathers puffed, making the sneezing noise again.

I worry that she has an egg stuck but the shoving the golf ball underneath herself thing has me wondering if she's going broody. I also worry that I'm totally disrupting her natural schedule by moving her around but I don't want her baking in the coop all day or missing meals.

Any ideas?

 

[KellyHM]

That sneezing noise is her growling at you.

Sounds like a broody to me. Give up now and put some eggs under her.

 

[SunshineSilkies]

Sounds broody to me too!!!! Quick...find some eggs to put under her!

 

[canada-goose]

You have a broody there. I love having a broody around. They are so fun to watch.

 

[foweler]

OK, I came home for lunch and now she's in the nest. So is my Brown Leghorn who hasn't layed yet but should any minute. They are both jammed into the same nest box. This is getting weird.

 

[foweler]

Ok, she's definitely broody, crap! I don't have any fertile eggs and I can't have any more chicken's anyhow (not that I wouldn't love to hatch and have more chicken's of course).

She did lay and I did lift her up and leave her with nothing but her golf ball so I'm not worried about being egg bound.

Is there any way to stop her from being broody? I don't want her starving in a hot coop without pooping all day long. I'd kind of like the egg production too.

On another note, on 7/20/09 the Leghorn has landed! My Brown Leghorn laid my first white egg today! It had some dried blood on it but she looks OK. Is that a problem?

I was really looking forward to 3 eggs a day but now my Pepper has gone broody

 

[KellyHM]

You can throw her into another pen that doesn't have a nest box and see if that will break the broodiness. A lot of chickens have a little blood when they lay their first egg...or first few...so I wouldn't worry too much about that.

 

[ray2310]

Quote:
We had the same problem with one our hens. We kept her in our garage seperate from the others, in a wire dog kennel. After 3-4 days she was back to her old self.

 

[cackler]

Foweler - How did things end up? I have a hen that's doing the exact same thing. All of the other girls are getting tired of her setting in their favorite nest box - without any production! We haven't put her in a dog box yet but it's getting closer if she doesn't snap out of this!

 

[foweler]

Well I built a broody cage out of pvc with a hardware cloth bottom and poultry wire everywhere else. I had her in for a couple of days (bringing it the house at night) and would let her out to roam around a little during the day.

Here's what happened. She would lay her bare belly (she has plucked all of her belly feathers, I guess they do that t keep the nest warmer) on the hardware cloth and was rubbing herself raw.

The other two chickens would hang out around or under her cage. They like to stay together. Egg production suddenly dropped off completely from not only the newly laying leghorn but the steady red as well.

I think my jailing the LB discombobulated the whole flock.

I gave up on the cage and my LB is currently acting "half broody". I will pull her out of the nest to eat and poop and she will hang out with the other birds for a while and sometimes quite a while before heading back to the nest. I have decided as long as shes not starving I'm OK with whatever she wants to do.

The other two got back to laying (although the BL only lays every 2 or 3 days. She has done a couple of days in a row but not often) and the broody has started coming out on her own, sometimes spending most of the out. She still goes back to the nest eventually.