Hen with chicks

[sweetshoplady]

My broody just hatched out some under the tractor. I partitioned off an area with boards and poultry wire and put food and water in there for easy access for the earlier hatched siblings. You may see one or two come out of mama while she waits for the others to hatch. WHen she's done hatching, she'll come off the nest. (when mine did that, I cleaned up the messy nest and removed the unhatched eggs)

Congrats on your new mama hen and her babies! I hope she has a terrific hatch!

The ramp is an excellent idea.

 

[CityGirlintheCountry]

I have four that mama silkie hatched out a week ago. I moved the mom and eggs into a nest box a week before she hatched them as my nest boxes are 18" off the ground as well.
Two of mine hatched out in the morning and the other two hatched the following night. Mama stayed on the nest for another day or so until I moved the bad eggs off the nest. While she was still lingering on the nest the babies stayed up under her or in the dog kennel brooder. Once I moved those eggs though, everybody got really zippy! They are fast and active little suckers!
My coop is about a foot off the ground and I have a foot wide ramp leading up into it. Mama and babies are in the coop. I assumed that they would be able to follow her in and out. It seems that they aren't that coordinated yet. I left them in the coop one morning and went out about an hour later to find a baby on the ground chirping like crazy. It couldn't find it's way back up and mama was still kind of in "sit on the nest" mode. The big chickens were all standing around it and weren't hurting the baby, but it was really, really chilled. Thankfully it was a fairly warm day here (up in the 50s). Since then I have put them either in the coop with the door closed or put them all the way in the run with mama. Today they all managed to negotiate the ramp down, but none have figured out the way up yet.
Yours may be smarter than mine (

), but you will worry less if you have them low to the ground.

Feel free to PM me if you have any questions. I'm a week or so ahead of you so maybe I can give you a heads up as to what is coming. It's nerve racking if you don't know what's next!