nicolevg
Songster
We purchased our 10 original hens as one-year-olds this past early April. Due to predators, we now have 5 (1 olive egger, 3 Ameraucanas, & 1 Buff Orpington). We went out of town for a long weekend recently, meaning eggs accumulated in the nesting boxes, and now our Buff is very broody. She's been spending the last 3 days sitting on eggs all day.
Since our family needs more eggs than what 5 chickens can produce in a week, I was thinking of taking advantage of her broodiness & buying some hatching eggs before the end of the season so we have more egg production over the winter (since egg production would decrease anyway in the winter months). I'm not only brand new to chicken keeping (still in my first year), but also have NO experience with fertile eggs or chicks, so I could really use y'all's knowledge & expertise.
1) I found a dozen fertile RIR eggs online from Bresse Farms. Has anyone purchased from this farm before? Would you recommend them? I'm thinking getting a dozen eggs would probably be a good idea even though I'd only like an additional 4-5 laying hens, since I'm sure some eggs won't hatch and some chicks won't make it to adulthood.
2) Will I need to isolate the broody hen once the chicks hatch, so the other hens don't peck at the babies? (I already know I'll need to provide them starter grower feed & water that's lower that they can easily access.)
3) Our hens weren't touched much as chicks (we purchased them from a local producer), so they've never been very friendly or easy to catch/tame (hence why half our flock has died already. It's proven very difficult to wrangle them all up each evening after they've been free ranging on our acre property, meaning the local bobcat family that lives in our neighbor's wooded area has had a field day watching the stragglers and picking them off one by one when one hen strays from the rest of the flock while I try to get them all back in the coop at sunset.) Ideally, I'd love to have hens that enjoyed being petted and held & didn't run from me so much when I try to catch them. I'm thinking, if I were to isolate the mother hen and her chicks once we've hatched & put them in the extra large dog crate we have until they're 6-10 weeks old (thus, allowing me easier access to touch them and take care of them / get them used to human touch while still not traumatizing the broody hen & allowing her to stay with them), would that help their sociability with humans/me?
4) Would there be any repercussions if I were to separate the chicks from the broody hen once they were hatched? I don't really want to make the investment in all the equipment incubating eggs without a broody hen would take. However, I also don't want chicks that aren't friendly towards me because they were 100% raised by a hen. Would that be too traumatizing for her if I took her babies away for 6 weeks or so? (She's already a very vocal, demanding, high-strung bird. I can't tell if she's the alpha of the flock, but she's either #1 or #2. Before we expanded the run & back when we still had 10 hens, she and the other 3 Buffs we had were very aggressive towards the rest of the flock, always pecking at them and being mean to the point where our whole flock was/is featherless on their backs and butts still to this day. I'm hoping their fall molt helps with that. Thankfully, pecking is not a problem anymore since they have SO much space with the smaller flock & extended chicken run. I'm thinking becoming a mother might help her. She's already calmed down A LOT since becoming broody & isn't nearly as flighty and peckish at the other hens.)
Since our family needs more eggs than what 5 chickens can produce in a week, I was thinking of taking advantage of her broodiness & buying some hatching eggs before the end of the season so we have more egg production over the winter (since egg production would decrease anyway in the winter months). I'm not only brand new to chicken keeping (still in my first year), but also have NO experience with fertile eggs or chicks, so I could really use y'all's knowledge & expertise.
1) I found a dozen fertile RIR eggs online from Bresse Farms. Has anyone purchased from this farm before? Would you recommend them? I'm thinking getting a dozen eggs would probably be a good idea even though I'd only like an additional 4-5 laying hens, since I'm sure some eggs won't hatch and some chicks won't make it to adulthood.
2) Will I need to isolate the broody hen once the chicks hatch, so the other hens don't peck at the babies? (I already know I'll need to provide them starter grower feed & water that's lower that they can easily access.)
3) Our hens weren't touched much as chicks (we purchased them from a local producer), so they've never been very friendly or easy to catch/tame (hence why half our flock has died already. It's proven very difficult to wrangle them all up each evening after they've been free ranging on our acre property, meaning the local bobcat family that lives in our neighbor's wooded area has had a field day watching the stragglers and picking them off one by one when one hen strays from the rest of the flock while I try to get them all back in the coop at sunset.) Ideally, I'd love to have hens that enjoyed being petted and held & didn't run from me so much when I try to catch them. I'm thinking, if I were to isolate the mother hen and her chicks once we've hatched & put them in the extra large dog crate we have until they're 6-10 weeks old (thus, allowing me easier access to touch them and take care of them / get them used to human touch while still not traumatizing the broody hen & allowing her to stay with them), would that help their sociability with humans/me?
4) Would there be any repercussions if I were to separate the chicks from the broody hen once they were hatched? I don't really want to make the investment in all the equipment incubating eggs without a broody hen would take. However, I also don't want chicks that aren't friendly towards me because they were 100% raised by a hen. Would that be too traumatizing for her if I took her babies away for 6 weeks or so? (She's already a very vocal, demanding, high-strung bird. I can't tell if she's the alpha of the flock, but she's either #1 or #2. Before we expanded the run & back when we still had 10 hens, she and the other 3 Buffs we had were very aggressive towards the rest of the flock, always pecking at them and being mean to the point where our whole flock was/is featherless on their backs and butts still to this day. I'm hoping their fall molt helps with that. Thankfully, pecking is not a problem anymore since they have SO much space with the smaller flock & extended chicken run. I'm thinking becoming a mother might help her. She's already calmed down A LOT since becoming broody & isn't nearly as flighty and peckish at the other hens.)
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