How Can I Get A Hen UN Broody?

[maddog3355]

If your selling eggs you have the wrong chickens!! Lol. Get you some sexlinks or leghorns if your wanting to sell eggs and then sharpen your pencil because your not going to make much besides feed money.

 

[snaffle]

I finally got miss-wanna-be-a-mom hen to break.

Every time I went in to the barn I would remove her from the cage and jostle her around. She wasnt too crazy about that...

I also hung the cage from the ceiling and would give it a little push which caused it to swing for a bit.

She certainly was the hardest so far

 

[Ambulancedriver]

Has anyone ever tried the frozen water bottle trick? I've heard you can.put a frozen water bottle under a broody to break them.. lowers body temperature.. I've never tried this... I have two broody hens... we bought an incubator this spring and hatched 19.. then had a broody barred rock, and hatched 6 under her... we let her sit, since it was our first time with a broody hen...

 

[Betsy57]

The hen is a cochin banty.

Don't worry folks...when the temps are warmer she has access to a pan of water.

I have the cage hanging about 2 feet off the ground. Several times today I when I was in the building, I would step inside the pen...and give the cage a push so it would swing.

She is still wanting to be a mother.

The main reason I am trying to get her out of the broodiness is because a hen can drop a lot of weight when setting. I have had hens die on the nest because they refuse to get off the nest to eat and drink.

She has been broody for close to 3 weeks... maybe longer.

It is time for her to stop!!

A hen can lose a lot of weight and die from no food and water too. I have two broodies now I am trying to break. I put them in a cage with plenty of food and water. They're away from the other hens (in my basement). They have light on all the time. These two do this all the time and it is frustrating. Sometimes it just takes a few days other times it takes a week to break them. One will be broody for a week and then will lay eggs again for a month and then go broody again. I get them out and let them in the yard to roam a bit in a fenced in area every few days. Last night one laid an egg but when I put her back in the coop she made a bee-line to the nest so back in the basement she goes. Patience and isolation in a spot that is not where she would want to sit (wire care) on eggs.

 

[currycat]

We had a stubborn one and finally my husband just kept checking for eggs every time we heard the egg song and taking them, really PO'd her, had to use heavy gloves. After about a week she gave up, left the coop like nothing had ever happened. Has not tried to brood again.

 

[amy2716]

I usually have success using the crate elevated off the floor for a couple days. However, I did have one broody who absolutely would not break, and out of desperation, I used something similar to the frozen water bottle. I froze water in gallon ziplock bags laid flat in the freezer and placed them under the wire floor of the crate. It took some coordinating to keep up with replacing the bags as they thawed, but within a day, she was broke.

 

[sunny815]

An old lady I used to work for said that she used to put her broody hens in a gunny sack and hang it from a tree overnight. That would be baiting predators in my area. So I've altered that method a little. I go in at bedtime and put the chicken in a lightweight cotton pillowcase and hang the pillow case from the rafters of the hen house for the night, letting them out in the morning. Allowing air to circulate around the chicken's bum helps break the brood. Sometimes it takes a second night.

 

[itzybitzyfarm]

When the temps are hot you GIVE her water? That's big of you! Geez, why dont you torture the hen for just doing what comes naturally. Good grief, some people should not be allowed to have animals.

 

[Iherb]

I've tried this year to prevent my chickens from going broody. (but I do have a bantum that is this way all the time, it's ok I just let her) I've been cooling their favorite dusting off place and shade place so it doesn't get too warm by spraying it down with the hose. I'm hoping it works because I feed and water them good stuff and I need the eggs to justify having them. BTW I hope nobody gets offended by some comments people have- they just aren't worth it. I want to have these boards go on so be nice people. It gets discouraging when everyone is such a critic and unsupportive.

 

[WthrLady]

Tossing in my two cents.

My coop is maxed out with chicken numbers and just doesn't need more chicks running around. So while it would be nice to let my Miss Broody Butts go au naturale, it just isn't practical. When hens go broody, something in their brains just snaps. They aren't normal chickens anymore, they are nuts.

Letting a hen go broody and NOT sit on eggs, can lead to death. Sitting on eggs to hatching lasts 21 days, and while they do eat and drink during that time, the amount of weight they loose is shocking. When they are NOT sitting on eggs, but acting the part, they'll sit long past the 21 days, and can even starve to death.

The broody breaker cage hasn't worked here, but I would always provide food and water at all times. The cage has small hardware wire for it's bottom to allow cooler air to circulate around their warm bum.

The idea being, that the cooler air constantly cooling them off, helps turn off their nutty switch.

I'm not a fan of the ice eggs substitutions, the ice in a bag in the nest box, or the frozen bottles of water method. I think it would be too cold, but my biggest problem is the moisture. The added moisture from condensation or melting gets into the nest boxes, and makes a mess with the other birds. Dusty birds, and wet = extra dirty eggs. (my broodies switch boxes, and other hens have no problem sitting on top of a broody, when you gotta go, you gotta go!)

Removing them every time they crawl into the nest box works for one of my hens, but you have to be diligent and do it all day long for a couple days.

What has worked for my stubborn Lavender Orpington and my Olive Egger is a cool, NOT COLD, bath. We have 100' days AND my hens are used to show baths. So going into water isn't traumatic for them. They actually just sit in three inches of water, feet resting on a washcloth, sitting in a large old roasting pan, like a duck (not floating, sitting). I sit with them the whole time. There is nothing in the water, but water. After 5-10 minutes, I lift them out, let them drip for a second, and spend the afternoon drying and preening. Two to three days, and no more Miss Broody Butt.

Eggs laying comes later. Broody here isn't about egg drop in production. A broody sits for three weeks and kicks back into laying about 3 -4 weeks later, so 7 weeks of no eggs from that hen. Stopping a broody, and you can still be without eggs from that hen for 3-5 weeks. HOWEVER, if you have more than one hen going broody, OR you are maxed out in your population or breeding program, all those non-layers can really hit the pocketbook hard at the peak of the season.

So I guess it boils down to finding something that works for you, works for the hen you are dealing with it, and being patient with the process.