HELP! Two broody hens at the same time and my first time allowing a hen to hatch

[RedneckGurl]

HELP! I'm freaking out just a little bit. No, that's a total lie. I'm freaking out a LOT! We have two hens broody at the same time and sharing the same nursery room in our new coop. It's a fairly big room with a sand floor and it's own separate pop door with access to a fenced in area that's about 10' x 15'. We initially set up the area for one hen and gave her 5 eggs to sit on. I have no idea how long the second hen has been sitting because my sister was visiting and wandering around our back lot and found her on a secret nest under an old dog house roof. We moved her and the eggs she was sitting on into the nursery alongside the other hen who we had purposefully set up in there. The hen from the secret nest had like 16 eggs under her and I have no idea what date she started sitting on them. I took some of them and put under the other hen because there was no way one hen could raise that many chicks. Now one has 11 eggs and the other has 10 eggs. We have to be approaching the 21 day mark soon and I'm panicking about how this is going to work. What to do if all the eggs don't hatch at the same time? What if one or both of the hens turn out to be bad mothers and reject or even attack the chicks? Will they be okay to raise their babies in the same area? I've been keeping chickens now for over seven years but this is my first time allowing a hen to hatch eggs because I've never had a setup where it could work until we built this new coop. ANY advice, help, comments, words of wisdom, etc. would be SO welcome right now!

 

[cherrynberry]

HELP! I'm freaking out just a little bit. No, that's a total lie. I'm freaking out a LOT! We have two hens broody at the same time and sharing the same nursery room in our new coop. It's a fairly big room with a sand floor and it's own separate pop door with access to a fenced in area that's about 10' x 15'. We initially set up the area for one hen and gave her 5 eggs to sit on. I have no idea how long the second hen has been sitting because my sister was visiting and wandering around our back lot and found her on a secret nest under an old dog house roof. We moved her and the eggs she was sitting on into the nursery alongside the other hen who we had purposefully set up in there. The hen from the secret nest had like 16 eggs under her and I have no idea what date she started sitting on them. I took some of them and put under the other hen because there was no way one hen could raise that many chicks. Now one has 11 eggs and the other has 10 eggs. We have to be approaching the 21 day mark soon and I'm panicking about how this is going to work. What to do if all the eggs don't hatch at the same time? What if one or both of the hens turn out to be bad mothers and reject or even attack the chicks? Will they be okay to raise their babies in the same area? I've been keeping chickens now for over seven years but this is my first time allowing a hen to hatch eggs because I've never had a setup where it could work until we built this new coop. ANY advice, help, comments, words of wisdom, etc. would be SO welcome right now!

If they are bad mothers, take the chicks and put them in a brooder. And...if there are any more eggs left in the nest and the hens leave (they will leave once most of their chicks have hatched for 1-3 days), put it in an incuabator. If one hens hatches her chicks first and starts to teach them to eat/drink, she will not sit on the rest of the eggs. Put the rest of the eggs under the other hen. But because thats a lot of eggs, candle them first (the ones you dont know the age of) and remove any "bad" eggs.

 

[RedneckGurl]

I guess I'll need to buy an incubator as I don't have one. Any suggestions on brand, type, etc?

 

[cherrynberry]

I guess I'll need to buy an incubator as I don't have one. Any suggestions on brand, type, etc?

You don’t HAVE to buy one, but if you have set your mind on it, I would recommend the incuview 360 incubator