I really don't want to keep chicks in a brooder as it seems that they are healthier raised by a hen, but I have a problem with 2 of the babies I tried to slip onto my broody hen.
To back up a bit I bought silkie eggs off of eBay planning to put them under my black silkie hen who had been broody for a while. Somehow she had 5 eggs under her which we planned to remove and replace with the ones we bought but the day the eggs came one of her eggs hatched and we fired up the incubator thinking she would soon be off the nest but no she stayed and a few days later hatched another chick. Over two weeks later she was still broody and hatched one more chick leaving two eggs which she continued to sit on. She was still sitting when the incubator eggs hatched a couple days ago. We ended up with 9 silkie babies from the incubator so wanted to put the new babies with the momma and older chicks. We had moved her and her 3 chicks to a temporary cage while we cleaned her nest. She and her chicks are doing fine there so we put the nine new babies under her and everything seemed to go ok until she got a good look at the new babies: Seven of the babies are blue or black and two are partridge. When the babies come out from under to eat and drink she is fine with all but the partridge. She pecks at the partridge ones only, the others she has accepted. BTW we removed the two eggs that she has been sitting on forever to make room for all the chicks.
Does anyone have any ideas to get her to accept these babies?
To back up a bit I bought silkie eggs off of eBay planning to put them under my black silkie hen who had been broody for a while. Somehow she had 5 eggs under her which we planned to remove and replace with the ones we bought but the day the eggs came one of her eggs hatched and we fired up the incubator thinking she would soon be off the nest but no she stayed and a few days later hatched another chick. Over two weeks later she was still broody and hatched one more chick leaving two eggs which she continued to sit on. She was still sitting when the incubator eggs hatched a couple days ago. We ended up with 9 silkie babies from the incubator so wanted to put the new babies with the momma and older chicks. We had moved her and her 3 chicks to a temporary cage while we cleaned her nest. She and her chicks are doing fine there so we put the nine new babies under her and everything seemed to go ok until she got a good look at the new babies: Seven of the babies are blue or black and two are partridge. When the babies come out from under to eat and drink she is fine with all but the partridge. She pecks at the partridge ones only, the others she has accepted. BTW we removed the two eggs that she has been sitting on forever to make room for all the chicks.
Does anyone have any ideas to get her to accept these babies?
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