eggs hatching any day...not sure when though

[misterhandsome]

I'm sure the answers to my questions are here somewhere, but I've searched and searched and can't find them.

We let our broody hen sit on two eggs. This is our first time hatching, and of course I didn't write down the day the eggs were laid or the expected hatch day. I thought the big day was to be August 14, which is a weekend so we'd be around and keeping a close eye, but when I candled the eggs today they look like they're further along and might go mid-week.

Our nesting boxes are about 10x12 and two feet off the ground. I'm concerned that if the eggs hatch while we're at work the chicks will either be squat by the hen or fall out of the box.

My questions are:
Should we move hen and eggs to a safer location at ground level or leave them be?
Will confining miss broody in a safer location for the chicks drive her mad, especially if it's too soon? She leaves the nest daily for eats, drinks, baths, etc.

 

[misterhandsome]

I just found an old post....the eggs the broody is sitting on are from July 20 and 21. I've read that eggs incubated by broodies will hatch sooner than those done in incubators, so we're figuring they will hatch Tuesday or Wednesday.

Should I segregate Janice Soprano and her eggs tomorrow morning or just leave things up to nature? There's a rooster and five other hens in the flock.

 

[skillswife]

I recently posted a similar question. My broody is due around the 11th not 100% sure though. And I have it so I can lock her up in the nesting box, which is quite large, room for food and water etc... But I didn't want to lock her up too soon. Anyhow everyone pretty much has their own ideas not a big consensus. I have been locking her up but letting her out for a supervised nest leaving romp in the mornings. Mostly supervised to make sure other hens don't lay eggs with the others. I tried to move this same broody with her last failed hatch and moving her was bad, she refused the nest, escaped the pen and the eggs didn't survive. So my advise is if you can leave her in the nest box its best, but then there is the worry of the other chickens or the hen leaving the eggs, thats why I built a little door and enclosed the nest box in wire. Sorry I think I am tired and rambling, but from personal experience my broody wants to be in her nest where its at. People say that falling from that height doesn't hurt the chicks and mama usually assists in leaving the nest and then will protect them from the other chickens. She won't squash the chicks if she has enough room in the nest box, if she is a good mama she will know just what to do.

 

[mstricer]

Quote:
I had the same thing happen, gave her a great place to raise some babies, Butttttttt NO she was having no part escape through a 5 inch diameter hole all the way back to coop. I'm just leaving her be, I think hens will protect their babies, I hope she will, that's how it works in the cartoons right, remember Fog Horn Leghorn. He protected the babies

LOL I'm so going to download a bunch of those cartoons.

 

[Gypsy07]

Quote:
This isn't what I've experienced at all. Every single incubator hatch I've done, I get chicks on day 21, day 22 at the latest. I recently let my first ever broody hen hatch sit on some eggs, and I didn't get my first pip till day 24 or 25, I forget which now. Whichever one it was, it was WAY later that I was used to...

 

[misterhandsome]

Quote:
I'm hoping that's the case because it will bring us to the weekend and we'll be around. She's still sitting tight for now, and I don't want to move her to see if there's a pip. I've never been one for waiting...

 

[okiedrifter]

I have always treated my chicks like precious puff balls...... went to a chicken house to help them unload a truck boy howdy they throw those poor babys 30-40 feet to land in about 6 inches of shavings it about drove me crazy.....but if they didnt those poor babys run under the tractor and got run over.....it was the last time I offered to help....

 

[spacecowgirl]

Quote:
My neighbor's boss owns chicken houses and he told me the same thing...they just dump out boxes of day old chicks at waist-height and they hit the ground and run! The ones who don't run don't always make it.

I don't know if I could witness this myself, but he swears that's the way they do it and the vast majority of them are perfectly fine.