How quickly does a broody hen kick out the chicks

[Faraz1]

So my broody hen has been a good mama and I have raised many chicks under her. This time however I have been tracking the time it takes for her to kick out her chicks. It has been exactly 7 weeks since the 2 chicks under her hatched.

Today i unlocked the coop and found one of the chicks slightly bloody (From pecking) and both huddled in a corner hiding from mama hen. When i opened the cage, the mama hen ran out and showed no interest in the chicks. I checked the nesting area and found a freshly laid egg !

I guess that must have triggered her to loose interest in the chicks ? 7 weeks seems like a short time or is it normal ?

 

[AidKD]

It's around 6 weeks that the mama starts losing interest in her babies. Not all that unusual, but a little odd that she would turn so quickly like that.

 

[LTAY1946]

6-7 week old chicks should be able to fend for themselves I would think. I have some that age from incubation and not a broody and they don't need a mama hen. They just need feed and water.

 

[Faraz1]

It's around 6 weeks that the mama starts losing interest in her babies. Not all that unusual, but a little odd that she would turn so quickly like that.

I think it might have been the egg that she laid in the nest ? Could also because she is a shamo breed (Japanese game bird)

 

[Shadrach]

7 weeks is better than average ime. There is no fixed time.
The end of chick raising can be pretty savage.

 

[Faraz1]

Thanks. It was like a switch has flipped and she is chasing her chicks away. The poor guys keep going to her and she is not interested.

 

[K0k0shka]

Sounds about right, though it does vary between hens. But it's definitely not too early. If they are fully feathered, then they don't need her anymore. Some hens wait the bare minimum and kick them out, some do it even earlier, some do it a lot later, and some never do. I have one super mama who never kicks her chicks out. She stays friends with them indefinitely. She is raising chicks right now (about a month old) and her daughter from last year, who is a year old and a laying grown woman, is tagging along with her younger siblings. Mama feeds and protects both generations. It was kind of funny, while mama was sitting on the eggs and not around to fight her grown daughter's battles, the grown daughter got demoted to the lower roost (they all used to sleep together on the top roost). Now that her mom is roosting again with the new babies, the daughter is back up on the top roost, next to her. It looks a bit like coddling, like the hen never let go, but that's not really what's going on. The daughter was the only female of a brood of 7, and I had to cull the males. So she was left all alone early, and you know how chickens are with younger generations. Everybody but her mom chased her around, she had no micro flock the way new chicks do when integrating, so she clung to her mom too long, and the mom was nice enough to let it happen. So that's lucky for the daughter. If her mom had been one of those early quitters, or even on time quitters, she would've been quite lonely. I had another hen hatch and raise chicks last year as well, and she was done with them at 2-3 weeks, before they were even feathered out. Super mama was raising chicks at that time, too, and adopted the other hen's chicks. They definitely still needed a mom, so they got lucky, too.

 

[AidKD]

I have a mama who is now broody for the second time. With her first hatch there really wasn't a point of "kicking them out", it was more of a gradual thing were the chicks would start to go off and do their own thing throughout the day, and the mama let it happen. I'm so glad that I've never had major problems with chicks and integrating before!

 

[Ridgerunner]

I've had broody hens wean their chicks at 3 weeks, I've had some go over two months. There is no set time or even what I'd call an average time. But it has never been before the chicks could take care of themselves.

My broody hens raise their chicks with the flock so the broody takes care of integration. Even the three week olds were able to handle themselves around the flock when they were weaned.

 

[Faraz1]

The main concern i had with not keeping with the main flock was feed. Mama hen and chicks were on crumb and rest of flock was on layers pellets. I would need to switch the whole flock to grower feed when i plan to integrate them together. I guess that would be around the 12 week time to switch from crumb right ?