Hatching with 2 broodies

[tommysgirl]

Tommysgirl,
They are just precious, I hope they are all girls. Are you going to put them with Mom tonight?

Why cant we invent something to tell if the EGG is a male or female? I am going to work on that. We could change the world!! Oh boy, I wish I had studied biology. There has to be a way....

Thanks but I actually hope the little dark one is a cockerel I would be super happy to have a pair of the Konzas and have the two Pita Pintas be pullets but mostly I am hoping that I have one of each with the Konzas. The graft went well she is clucking away and they are wandering about her nest box with her. They have food and water. She is emmense so there is lots of room under her. one of the Pita Pintas is smaller and was doing a lot of cheeping yesterday. It is much happier under mama.

Hey Team,
Well I'm sorry I haven't been on for ages as I have been very busy I hope everyone is well as well as there chickens & chicks

everyone over here is good and guess what three weeks ago yesterday Sunshine my rhode rock hen went broody and she hatched out six cream crested legbar chicks which are auto-sexing and we have 3 hens, 2 cockerels and 1 mystery yellow fluff ball I am going to keep the two cockerels as they are going to be my new layers and breeders next year but also my uncle had put the same cream crested legbar eggs in his incubator and some other breed eggs just a day after sunshine had her eggs so last night we gave her six chicks from the incubator 4 hens, 1 black mottled Peking chick and another yellow mystery fluff ball and then what ever else hatches today we are also going to give her sunshine is such a good mummy and has taken to them straight away mhhmmm it's going to be a strange sight to see a hen with 15 odd chicks Lol I will make sure to post lots of pics also Millie's two chicks are grown up now the one with the black bobble on its head turned out to be a cockerel and the more goldfish one a hen I have now sold the cockerel to a lovely lady. But as for Muffin she turned out to be not such a good mum she hatched two chicks out and one just suddenly went missing with no traces and then the remaining chick she did have was very small and never thrived and at night the little thing would go and sleep under Maddy with her three babies but a couple of days ago the little one just went missing again with no traces and I was very unhappy I do not think I am going to let Muffin hatch any more chicks out as I don't want this to happen again

but on the other hand Maddy successfully hatched out all three of the eggs I gave her and she is a brilliant mum I will try and post pics of everyone.
Take Care
P.s congrats teila on your egg from Cilla
Ella

Welcome back thanks for the update and the pictures. Sorry muffin wasn't such a good mama. My Julie is OK except for that at nigh she gives the babies to Gracie Belle to sit on and she sleeps on the poo tray. I don't get it but it seems to be working for them.

I moved my brooder babies...Marans and Marans crosses out to the broody pen so they are outside birds now. I am pretty sure that there are at least 2 pullets in that bunch

and @ItalyChickie remember how I told you that one black baby of Gracie's was a sex link...I was wrong! It still may be a pullet but I noticed the other day that it has black legs so I got an Australorp egg confused and mixed in with the Delawares and that baby is an Australorp. Totally keeping it if it is a pullet.

So my chicken acquisition is almost complete for the summer. I will be picking up New Hampshire Chicks at the end of the month/beginning of next month. They will be similar in size to other chicks I have here so I am just going to integrate them...Should be seamless. haha famous last words

 

[Lesa Mae]

I always did it at night and then went down to the coop at first light to see if all was well. It always was fortunately. Maybe someone else can chime in about adding them during the day. I would feel ok to do it if you could see how things go. If she pecks them a little sometimes it is to tell them to get under her. She starts schooling them right away.
Marie

I'll give you my 2 cents on giving them to her during the day!! If you recall my first hatch had 3 co-mommas so as the final 3 eggs hatched they were in the general population so I just popped them in with the other babies under momma during the day as I discovered they hatched had no issues at all with that but remember momma already had 4 chicks at that point!

 

[Teila]

Howdy Team

Aaaaw TG beautiful bubbies! How white is that little white one?; needed sunglasses to look

Good to hear that they have bonded with their new mumma

16 paws please do share when you figure out how to tell the boy eggs from the girl eggs; I am thinking that might be one of those life-time uncompleted projects

Nice to see you again CC, it does sound like you have been busy … beautiful pictures!

Me? I got nuff'n!

 

[Sonya9]

Question....when hatching under a broody in a confined space is there a higher risk of problems vs using an incubator? I mean would it be better/safer to continue using the incubator until they all hatch vs. slipping them under the broodies a couple of days before?

One of the hens is older, about 4, and while I am sure she was bred by her prior owner (for show) I think they must incubate the eggs artificially seeing as how he had chicks in separate pens, so this girl has probably never actually hatched her own, and I know the younger 11 month old broody never has.

I candled this morning, the 10th day....5 of 6 of the incubator eggs are developing nicely (6th had a detached air cell after shipping and was a dud).

 

[Lesa Mae]

Question....when hatching under a broody in a confined space is there a higher risk of problems vs using an incubator? I mean would it be better/safer to continue using the incubator until they all hatch vs. slipping them under the broodies a couple of days before?

One of the hens is older, about 4, and while I am sure she was bred by her prior owner (for show) I think they must incubate the eggs artificially seeing as how he had chicks in separate pens, so this girl has probably never actually hatched her own, and I know the younger 11 month old broody never has.

I candled this morning, the 10th day....5 of 6 of the incubator eggs are developing nicely (6th had a detached air cell after shipping and was a dud).

Are your hens broody now?? If they are and seem serious about this whole momma thing maybe try giving hem each an egg or 2?? If they are not broody I wouldn't put eggs or chicks in with them in fear of them completely ignoring the chicks and they likely wouldn't sit on these eggs to hatch them.

 

[Sonya9]

Are your hens broody now?? If they are and seem serious about this whole momma thing maybe try giving hem each an egg or 2?? If they are not broody I wouldn't put eggs or chicks in with them in fear of them completely ignoring the chicks and they likely wouldn't sit on these eggs to hatch them.

Oh yeah, I have two bantam hens that have been very broody for 2-3 weeks. I bought some bantam hatching eggs online for them, one has sat on 3 hatching eggs (was originally 5 but one broke and one was a dud). These are OEG Bantams so they seem pretty dedicated but as I said, neither has actually hatched out a clutch before.

The other is sitting on infertile eggs, and I have 5 healthy eggs developing in an incubator (all set at the same time, all BB Red OEGB chicks). I am just a bit hesitant regarding whether to hand the incubator eggs over to them a couple of days before hatch, or give them the hatched chicks instead. I hear so many "hatching death/problems/horror stories", the hens are in small confined spaces now but I wonder what is safer when the actual hatching takes place.

All three of us (the hens and me) have put a lot of effort into this so I want to make sure I don't screw up and they have some chicks to raise.

 

[Lesa Mae]

Oh yeah, I have two bantam hens that have been very broody for 2-3 weeks. I bought some bantam hatching eggs online for them, one has sat on 3 hatching eggs (was originally 5 but one broke and one was a dud). These are OEG Bantams so they seem pretty dedicated but as I said, neither has actually hatched out a clutch before.

The other is sitting on infertile eggs, and I have 5 healthy eggs developing in an incubator (all set at the same time, all BB Red OEGB chicks). I am just a bit hesitant regarding whether to hand the incubator eggs over to them a couple of days before hatch, or give them the hatched chicks instead.  I hear so many "hatching problems", the hens are in small confined spaces now but I wonder what is safer when the actual hatching takes place.

I am getting the big picture now!!! Wow that is quite a situation I'm guessing your concern is that the eggs may get broke in such a small area ??? Can you expand the nesting area so there is more room for them to move around while the others hatch??? I have the belief that a hen knows how to do this whole hatching and raising their babies better than we do, and you will never know until they have the opportunity to prove themselves . Good luck and please keep us posted as to what direction you go and how everything is going!!!

 

[tommysgirl]

@Sonya9 Just my personal experience but my incubator hatch rate is 5/36 and it is 41/ 53ish for chicks hatched on this property in the last year using broodies. My thought in addition to this is that if you leave it to nature you will have fewer issues than if you have humans mucking around. We all tend to obsess and worry but the reality is that it is all a crap shoot and you do what you can and hope for the best. Good Luck!

 

[Sonya9]

I am getting the big picture now!!! Wow that is quite a situation I'm guessing your concern is that the eggs may get broke in such a small area ??? Can you expand the nesting area so there is more room for them to move around while the others hatch??? I have the belief that a hen knows how to do this whole hatching and raising their babies better than we do, and you will never know until they have the opportunity to prove themselves

. Good luck and please keep us posted as to what direction you go and how everything is going!!!

Oh please don't misunderstand my broodys are not being kept in shoe boxes, they are in the coop and I will section off their own small areas when hatch time arrives. Actually one of them is sectioned off now, but that is because she has a bad case of sour crop and she needs to fast for a day or so.

@Sonya9 Just my personal experience but my incubator hatch rate is 5/36 and it is 41/ 53ish for chicks hatched on this property in the last year using broodies. My thought in addition to this is that if you leave it to nature you will have fewer issues than if you have humans mucking around. We all tend to obsess and worry but the reality is that it is all a crap shoot and you do what you can and hope for the best. Good Luck!

Well I must say so far the Brinsea mini incubator has done a very good job (shipped eggs, and 5 out of 6 have viable embryos at the 10 day mark, the non-viable had a detached air cell from shipping). That little machine turns them, allows for a programmable cool down period, keeps the humidity darn near perfect, no I don't work for Brinsea but I am impressed with it!)

And yes, I am nervous about the actual hatching part, I am sure you are right, hatching under real hens is far better than an incubator. I would bet the cheeping and mama talking is very encouraging to the littles trying to get out of the eggs. I have just never done this before and my girls have been working sooooo hard for chicks! It seems there is so much that can go wrong during the actual hatching part....but I need to trust and not over analyze (the fact I have two broodies and am still using an incubator kind of hints of over analyzing and hedging bets...lol).

Also I am not a breeder, I want a little rooster and if possible will keep all of the babies, so we won't be doing this every year.

 

[Farmer Viola]

Oh yeah, I have two bantam hens that have been very broody for 2-3 weeks. I bought some bantam hatching eggs online for them, one has sat on 3 hatching eggs (was originally 5 but one broke and one was a dud). These are OEG Bantams so they seem pretty dedicated but as I said, neither has actually hatched out a clutch before.

The other is sitting on infertile eggs, and I have 5 healthy eggs developing in an incubator (all set at the same time, all BB Red OEGB chicks). I am just a bit hesitant regarding whether to hand the incubator eggs over to them a couple of days before hatch, or give them the hatched chicks instead. I hear so many "hatching death/problems/horror stories", the hens are in small confined spaces now but I wonder what is safer when the actual hatching takes place.

All three of us (the hens and me) have put a lot of effort into this so I want to make sure I don't screw up and they have some chicks to raise.

the real variable in your equation is that your eggs are shipped. shipped eggs are extremely challenging to hatch and often result in low hatch rates! I think for that reason alone, I personally would hatch them inside and move them over once the chicks are dried and fluffed up. I would leave the developing eggs under the hen. basically I would keep everything the same as it is now, all the way through the hatch.

I think that changing conditions (incubator, broody, incubator, broody) may have killed some of my eggs. I had 5 eggs due at the same time (plus 2 more staggered a few days after; they haven;t hatched yet). I incubated them myself, and moved them under the broody when it was day 19. on day 21, one chick had hatched out and been accidentally (?) crushed by the hen. I am not sure why/how this happened, but I did remove the remaining 4 eggs and put them back in the incubator because of it. 2 eggs hatched, and 2 did not make it. 1 looks to have died around day 20 (probably when I took them back), and the other died earlier than that.

In the back of my mind I am wondering if changing their conditions and carrying them back and forth caused the 2 not to hatch... I wish I had just left them alone so I would know for sure. so I think that is my advice to you leave them there, and once they're out move them over.

The 2 survivors hatched yesterday and I gave them some time to get their legs working. once they were up and standing and fluffed out, I moved them under the broody hen. she accepted them immediately! I had them in my hand and covered them with my hoodie sleeve. I tucked them right under her wing and she never saw them. she started clucking to them right away. I also thought by putting them under the wing they might not get squished (the squished one was under her breast)