How can i teach one of my hens OR all of them to sit on their eggs 24 hours a day?

[Chicken Lovezer]

Hi All!

I am having some trouble...
we DONT have an incubator but we have many hens that could pretty much be capable of sitting on their own eggs... but they DONT
how can I teach any of my hens to sit on fertile and Non fertile eggs?

I will appreciate your help for the future

 

[Chicken Lovezer]

Yes we have Roosters and they have been Mating like crazy They only sit on their eggs when they are laying

 

[ChrisIsIt]

I dont think you teach them, they do it as they feel, eggs underneath or not

 

[wamtazlady]

You don't teach a hen to sit on eggs. It's a hormone thing. Some breeds of chickens seldom go broody. Others go broody all the time. You probably wouldn't want them all to be broody. When they get that way they stop laying eggs. They just sit in the nest all day long whether there are eggs in there or not, coming out maybe once a day to eat, drink, and poo.

If you do get a broody hen then it's time to save eggs. Don't put them under her right away. Wait until you have 8 or so eggs (if she is a full sized hen) and put the eggs under her all at the same time. Mark the eggs with pencil in case more eggs get laid in that box so you can remove those eggs.. By giving her all the eggs on the same day you ensure that the chicks will hatch in the same time frame.

This is my third year of having chickens. So far I have never had one go broody. However, at least one of the breeds (Buff Orpington to name one) I bought this year do go broody often so I expect I'll deal with a broody hen next year.