- Sep 18, 2012
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Hi,
One of my bantams, Honeydew has gone broody for the first time. I spoke to a breeder at the local farmers market who said that we could probably graft day old chicks once she'd been sitting for 2+ days straight. So yesterday (after ~5 days sitting) I picked up my 6 freshly hatched GL wyandotte chicks and then attempted to graft them last night.
Initially she coped well with the swap from the eggs to the chicks, and we monitored her over night. Early this morning DH checked on her to find that one of the chicks must have gotten out from under her and she'd pecked it into the corner. He rescued the chick, brought it inside and put it in with a heat pack. I then went out at day break, and she was still sitting on all the other chicks. When I went out she came out to feed/drink/poop. When she went back to her nest and discovered the chicks instead of her eggs she started pecking at them all. In the end I confiscated the chicks and took them back inside to snuggle up to the heat pack.
After searching the internet, I've since discovered that a first timer really should have been sitting for 2 - 3 weeks (d'oh!) before attempting to graft, so I think it was just way too early for Honey. I took her dummy eggs back out to her once I'd gotten the chicks settled, and she couldn't get those eggs back under her quick enough!
So what can I do now? Her eggs will never hatch, and the original idea was to let her have the whole mothering experience.. but now I don't know whether I can try to re-graft the chicks in a few days (I was thinking maybe Saturday - so they'll be 4 days old, and she'll have been sitting for 9 days... which is still not 2-3 weeks, but if I wait much longer the chicks will be too old/big and she probably won't take them anyway, right?) or whether I should just accept that it was not the best timing and these chicks will need to be raised under a lamp instead.
Which still doesn't do anything about Honey sitting on eggs that won't hatch, either. Gah! What do I do?
One of my bantams, Honeydew has gone broody for the first time. I spoke to a breeder at the local farmers market who said that we could probably graft day old chicks once she'd been sitting for 2+ days straight. So yesterday (after ~5 days sitting) I picked up my 6 freshly hatched GL wyandotte chicks and then attempted to graft them last night.
Initially she coped well with the swap from the eggs to the chicks, and we monitored her over night. Early this morning DH checked on her to find that one of the chicks must have gotten out from under her and she'd pecked it into the corner. He rescued the chick, brought it inside and put it in with a heat pack. I then went out at day break, and she was still sitting on all the other chicks. When I went out she came out to feed/drink/poop. When she went back to her nest and discovered the chicks instead of her eggs she started pecking at them all. In the end I confiscated the chicks and took them back inside to snuggle up to the heat pack.
After searching the internet, I've since discovered that a first timer really should have been sitting for 2 - 3 weeks (d'oh!) before attempting to graft, so I think it was just way too early for Honey. I took her dummy eggs back out to her once I'd gotten the chicks settled, and she couldn't get those eggs back under her quick enough!
So what can I do now? Her eggs will never hatch, and the original idea was to let her have the whole mothering experience.. but now I don't know whether I can try to re-graft the chicks in a few days (I was thinking maybe Saturday - so they'll be 4 days old, and she'll have been sitting for 9 days... which is still not 2-3 weeks, but if I wait much longer the chicks will be too old/big and she probably won't take them anyway, right?) or whether I should just accept that it was not the best timing and these chicks will need to be raised under a lamp instead.
Which still doesn't do anything about Honey sitting on eggs that won't hatch, either. Gah! What do I do?
