hen all of a sudden rejecting 3 of her 12 chicks - they are 4 weeks o

[FuzzyButtsFarm]

My broody hatched 4 out 4 eggs and has been a very good mother. They are now 4 wks. old and have completely intergrated with the other 15 hens in the coop along with the 10 from the other coop that they share a 16 x 48 run. One of which is a young roo. No one picks on the chicks and except for minor pecking order issues at snack time they all get along so far.

 

[lauriej57]

I can only wish my mama hen would push her chicks away. She's a banty cochin, she raised 3 standard size chicks last year, til they were around 12 weeks old, it was only my intervention that kept her from raising them any longer. She has 2 chicks this year, that are about 8 weeks old, these were day olds that were slipped under her at night. They are now the same size as her, and I've put them in with 2 chicks that are 2 weeks older, and 3 banties that are about 12 weeks old. They are all close to the same size right now.

I kept the mama hen separated from them for 2 days, put her in with the others, with no success. The 2 chicks were doing great, the others had accepted them, but then when mama went in, all went well for a couple of hours, her little leghorn did the best, but her little EE, who is as big as, if not a bit bigger than her ruined it. She wanted her mommy, and mommy wanted her baby, she then proceeded to her her away from the others, and coaxed the leghorn with her, then protected them, did a small bit of damage to one of the older chicks, nothing serious, but enough for me to separate them again. I found baby snuggled up under mama's wing, how they managed that, I do not know.

Back to the original question, why yours kicked out some of them, I really don't know the answer to that. Maybe they are a little bigger? and she feels they can take care of themselves, leaving her to care for the others better. Maybe that many chicks is to many for her. Is she a first time mama?

I have the different age chicks, because I lost 2 of the original 4 I slipped under her, then picked up three more, but they were older than i thought, but she looked after them fairly well for about 24 hours, then started protecting the original 2. Not bad, they learned quickly to stay away, but she wouldn't let them eat, so I put them in with the 3 banty chicks I had, that are about 4 weeks older, and for some reason, the 3 banties all mothered these chicks for me. It was good for me, it saved me having to have them in the house for a couple of weeks.

You could probably put the 3 chicks in a box in the coop, with a wire cover for a week or 2, and they will probably be fine.