I have a question!!!!

[ladybyrd3]

Can I go from letting my hens lay on their eggs and then on day 18 put the eggs in the incubator for the rest of the time?? Or is that too much of a drastic change for the eggs?

Reason for my question is I have 2 hens who share the laying on the eggs time and another hen that keeps cracking eggs and eating them I always find an egg broken in the midst of the other eggs (is this normal?) and I also noticed that the rooster is always hanging around the hens who are lying on the eggs. I'm just worried about the chicks getting ready to hatch that they will be killed by either the egg cracking hen or the rooster. Do roosters attack chicks??

 

[HorseFeatherz NV]

You can stick them in the bator, but a broody with chicks is fantastic - not to mention much easier on you.

Do you have some small kennels you can but the broodies in or some small hole chicken wire to make a small area for them? This is what I do - my broodies have plastic dog kennels and I have a section of my chicken run fenced off for them. Morning I carry the kennel out to the pen and open it - at night the chicks and broodies go back into their kennels then back to the coop.

Some roosters will kill the chicks as will some hens. Just this am, one chick wormed its way thru the chicken wire and into my bachelor pad - bitty chick was killed by the big boys.

Now my head roo - Versace - he is gentle and sweet to all the chicks - does not matter age. But my bantam RIR roo only likes the chicks once they are 12 weeks old or so.