Hatching - it never gets old, does it?

[TarheelBirdy]

I just watched a precious little keet pip, hatch and now sitting up, all while cooking dinner (my bator is in my kitchen, yes

)

It's amazing how some of them hatch right out like popcorn, but others take days. There is certainly no rhyme or reason (although PeepCA has come as close as I guess anyone can get with good, solid info) to these things....but it's just wonderful and addicting!

One more egg and I'm done for the season (unless of course I run up on another nest, lol).

 

[PeepsCA]

LOL... bet ya find another nest. It's not quittin' time yet, your Hens may lay eggs til September

 

[TarheelBirdy]

Well, remember - I only have the one hen that is laying age, and 34 acres. I know the general area where she is "sitting" right now - a brushy area near the pond - but can't seem to find it!!!!

 

[PeepsCA]

Ooh yah, 34 acres is a bit much to go tromping around looking for a well hidden pile of eggs. 10 acres is bad enough for me here, lol.

I have a Free Range Hen laying somewhere and I can't find her nest either. She is still coming home to roost with the flock at night, and always here for AM & PM feed time, but she goes MIA during most of the day. One minute she's there, the next she's vanished. She obviously hasn't gone broody yet, but I'm missing about 12-14 eggs from her so far that I was collecting each day, so could be any day that I'll stop seeing her. I don't need her to hatch out a clutch of keets, and I'm really missin' the free range eggs I was getting from her dangit, lol.

Have you tried going to that area you suspect she is in and calling them all for treats, about 10-11 am? That's usually when my free rangers are already lingering around their nesting area, so when I call mine for treats I see what direction they come from and which direction they head back to (her and her male)... and I can usually narrow it down a little more.

But then again there are days I'll walk right by a pile of eggs and miss it 10 times, like the one in my Iris bed right off my front deck that I'd been watering for over a week, (had 14 eggs in it, 2 Hens are laying in it for me still), lol.

Guineas, I swear!