Encourage broody EE pullet?

[amorgan]

So I have a EE pullet that seems to be acting a bit broody. For the past two days I've had to shoo her out of the nest box during the day and pick her up out of the nest box and place her on the roost at night. She was born in mid-february and the whole flock just got into full swing laying. I had placed some wooden eggs in the boxes to encourage them to lay there instead of the yard and it had worked like a charm! Of course, now I have a girl that wants to hatch them! I was hoping to have a broody hen to hatch eggs in a year or so, but not now. Should I keep her out of the box, or allow her to sit on the fake eggs? I don't want to permanently break the broodiness, but also don't want her to put herself thru such a commitment without a chance of success. I don't have a rooster, so there's no way to let her sit on an egg or two even if I wanted.

 

[lydiagirl99]

Look up breaking broody on here. You have to put them into a cage that has airflow from every angle to cool her down.

 

[aart]

If you don't want her to hatch out chicks, best to break her broodiness promptly. It won't necessarily break her 'permanently' but there's no guarantees for if and when a bird will go broody.

You'll need to decide if you want her to hatch out some chicks, and how you will 'manage' it.
Do you have, or can you get, some fertile eggs?
Do you have the space needed? She may need to be separated by wire from the rest of the flock.
Do you have a plan on what to do with the inevitable males? Rehome, butcher, keep in separate 'bachelor pad'?
If you decide to let her hatch out some fertile eggs, this is a great thread for reference and to ask questions.
It a long one but just start reading the first few pages, then browse thru some more at random.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/496101/broody-hen-thread


My experience with a broody breaker went like this: After her setting for 3 days and nights in the nest, I put her in a wire dog crate with smaller wire on the bottom but no bedding, set up on a couple of 4x4's right in the coop and I would feed her some crumble a couple times a day.

I let her out a couple times a day(you don't have to) and she would go out into the run, drop a huge turd, race around running, take a vigorous dust bath then head back to the nest... at which point I put her back in the crate. Each time her outings would lengthen a bit, eating, drinking and scratching more and on the 3rd afternoon she stayed out of the nest and went to roost that evening...event over, back to normal tho she didn't lay for another week or two.
Water nipple bottle added after pic was taken.