Help! Broody Mama Has to literally be fed, etc.

[khind]

My hen is one of those I've read about: she takes the broody gig so seriously that she doesn't eat or drink unless you pull her off to do so. I know this because I started to mark the food level. It wasn't until Day 4, when I picked her up and took her out of the nest, that she defecated for the first time (and it was a good-looking, huge, smelly, broody pile). That was when I started marking her food, and decided to take her off the nest once a day and try to feed and water her twice a day. I have her in a small but long coop all to herself (in a smaller crate within) that she's been used to going in part of the day for all her 2-3 years with me, so she's comfy. I've been able to get her to dust bathe and defecate in that coop now basically every other day, but I have to present food and water to her Daily quietly once she's gotten back into the nest, on her eggs, for her to consume any of it. And then, she doesn't eat or drink much (which is normal, I know). I think she's pretty darn calm with me, which is good. (I've had to take her in so many times to break her broodiness, we're pals! I just decided that since this work-at-home situation, I finally have time to learn about this other facet of chicken-keeping and allow her to sit on some eggs.) She seems to have accepted me as her midwife! Lol.
Yesterday, she pooped a worm which looked like a roundworm, so I treated her with a first round of Valbazen.
** Tonight will be the 18th day (because I put her on the eggs at night). I read you're supposed to leave Mama alone from here on out. But she will probably not eat or drink if I do that! So...
1. As long as I don't touch her eggs, I should still be able to feed and water her, right? Can I still take her off to defecate?
2. I just started putting electrolites in her water (and actually in the mash I make of her starter-grower feed, because she shows more interest in that now than in dry food) on about Day 16, which was the first day I'd read I should do that. Is there anything else I can add for her in the form of a supplement to that mash?: Nutridrench? Pedialite?
3. I just read something on ChickenChick.com that scratch grains are good to give a hen sitting on eggs also, to help provide some more carbs during her virtual hunger strike. (And Chicken Chick does Not advocate the use of scratch grains as a general rule; this is the only situation that I've seen she has.) Can I make some scratch grains? Can you all please look at the PICS of the grains and seeds I have at home, and let me know if any of them would work? (The unidentified bag on the right, pic 2, is Grape Nuts cereal! The small print bag close to the left is "red winter wheat for sprouting.")
Thank you so much!

 

[sdm111]

I've never saw or heard about a pile of bones in a nest.

 

[50-45-1]

I would not feed the scratch grains.
First your hen needs a crop full of grit to digest whole grains. If she is accustomed to grower which is already ground. who knows how she will do with it. Do you offer grit at all times?
I feed my broodies chick starter. Its what she will be given when the chicks arrive and its packed with nutrition.
Stray scratch grains could be bad for the chicks also if they swallowed them.

 

[khind]

I've never saw or heard about a pile of bones in a nest.

The fact that she didn't defecate for 4 days til I took her off the nest - what do you advise in that case? And her subsequent piles (every other day) have been much smaller, of course.

 

[khind]

I would not feed the scratch grains.
First your hen needs a crop full of grit to digest whole grains. If she is accustomed to grower which is already ground. who knows how she will do with it. Do you offer grit at all times?
I feed my broodies chick starter. Its what she will be given when the chicks arrive and its packed with nutrition.
Stray scratch grains could be bad for the chicks also if they swallowed them.

Her coop has a dirt floor which include, as you can imagine, a variety of small pebbles. The nest she's in has pine bark.
And I just double-checked: her food is 20% Starter Grower.

 

[khind]

I would not feed the scratch grains.
First your hen needs a crop full of grit to digest whole grains. If she is accustomed to grower which is already ground. who knows how she will do with it. Do you offer grit at all times?
That's a good point I hadn't thought of. Thank you.
Stray scratch grains could be bad for the chicks also if they swallowed them.
Good to know. The only way I would feed scratch would be for the broody hen. I plan on feeding only the nutritionally complete starter-grower to the chicks.
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