Intact egg is CHEEPING?!

[MIChickandGuinea]

Today is Day 21 for the eggs we gave to our first-time broody. The eggs all look intact, but there are baby chick sounds coming from at least one ?!?! Is that how this works?? Is that normal? Or a sign that a baby needs help?

 

[HuskerHens18]

It's normal! It means you have a chick hatching very soon! How exciting

 

[MIChickandGuinea]

It's normal! It means you have a chick hatching very soon! How exciting

How soon is soon? Like in an hour or in two days? This is new to us and we are very excited!

Do we need to move mommy and any hatchlings out to a separate coop for a couple days? Or will they be ok in the main coop? We do have an entire spare coop... but I don’t want to accidentally cause acceptance/integration problems for babies. or pecking order shuffles for the Mommy.

 

[HuskerHens18]

How soon is soon? Like in an hour or in two days? This is new to us and we are very excited!

Do we need to move mommy and any hatchlings out to a separate coop for a couple days? Or will they be ok in the main coop? We do have an entire spare coop... but I don’t want to accidentally cause acceptance/integration problems for babies. or pecking order shuffles for the Mommy.

Anywhere from a couple hours to 24, when they start peeping, it means it pipped a hole in their aircell at the fat end of the egg and is breathing air for the first time. The next step is it will peck a hole in the outer shell and breath fresh air! After it rests, it will start "zipping" in a circle until it can pop the top off the egg off like a lid. I love incubating eggs in a glass topped incubator so you can watch while they hatch

When all babies hatch I would personally suggest moving mommy and babies to a separate area, as some roosters and hens can get aggressive with new chicks and hurt them, or worse. When your chicks are several weeks old, you can decide if you think they're all ready to be integrated.
I have mean hens, so I waited to integrate until my chicks were two months old. But if you have docile chickens then you might have no issue.

 

[MIChickandGuinea]

Anywhere from a couple hours to 24, when they start peeping, it means it pipped a hole in their aircell at the fat end of the egg and is breathing air for the first time. The next step is it will peck a hole in the outer shell and breath fresh air! After it rests, it will start "zipping" in a circle until it can pop the top off the egg off like a lid. I love incubating eggs in a glass topped incubator so you can watch while they hatch

When all babies hatch I would personally suggest moving mommy and babies to a separate area, as some roosters and hens can get aggressive with new chicks and hurt them, or worse. When your chicks are several weeks old, you can decide if you think they're all ready to be integrated.
I have mean hens, so I waited to integrate until my chicks were two months old. But if you have docile chickens then you might have no issue.

I don’t know if our chickens are docile... we definitely anticipated more issues with integrating our new bantam flock with the established laying hens. But it was like a total non-event. The big girls ignored the babies for a couple days, pecked them a couple times each, and then went back to ignoring. Now they share a pen between their two coops, visit each other’s coops, and free-range together. But I don’t know how the bantams would do with adding new babies. There are lots of roosters in the bantam group. BUT! They are this spring’s babies and not yet mature. I haven’t seen any attempts at mating yet (bantam hens not laying yet either). Maybe less likely to be mean to babies since they’re not full-grown?

 

[HuskerHens18]

I don’t know if our chickens are docile... we definitely anticipated more issues with integrating our new bantam flock with the established laying hens. But it was like a total non-event. The big girls ignored the babies for a couple days, pecked them a couple times each, and then went back to ignoring. Now they share a pen between their two coops, visit each other’s coops, and free-range together. But I don’t know how the bantams would do with adding new babies. There are lots of roosters in the bantam group. BUT! They are this spring’s babies and not yet mature. I haven’t seen any attempts at mating yet (bantam hens not laying yet either). Maybe less likely to be mean to babies since they’re not full-grown?

Mommy will protect her babies, so you can give it a try, but make sure you're there for a while so you can watch for any mean behavior. Pecking is okay, it's just pecking order. But chasing, flinging, stomping, and biting is bad.
I am busy a lot during the day so I always found it easier to separate until the babies are a bit tougher, then I wasn't anxious while at work.

 

[whippoorwill0328]

I have no experience, so take what I just did with a grain of salt. We attempted to move our first time broody not long after she went broody. Disaster, she would not settle down. Moved her back and I just removed the extra eggs daily. At the advice of some wonderful people here, day before hatch day I sequestered her in the group coop. I used dog kennel and the panels you often see sold for brooding chicks and that effectively kept the chicks in and the big mean girls out. All but 1 of her eggs have hatched so I moved her, the egg and babies into our spare coop. (this egg came out of our incubator where it had been sequestered due to a bad air cell). It terrified mama but when she spotted her egg and got all her babies back around her, she settled right down. I only moved today as opposed to waiting for the last egg because the other hens were getting more and more curious and I didn’t want one of them jumping on top of the three sided off center dog crate and getting hurt or hurting the babies while I am at work tomorrow. Good luck!!! I am already mesmerized by the momma hen process . Hope you have a great hatch.

 

[MIChickandGuinea]

Mama left the nest for a few minutes, and I was able to see that there's a little peck in one of the shells! Of course, this is the way that chickens happen, and chickens are not rare or special. But it's so exciting to see it happening right here in my own nest box!!

 

[whippoorwill0328]

Mama left the nest for a few minutes, and I was able to see that there's a little peck in one of the shells! Of course, this is the way that chickens happen, and chickens are not rare or special. But it's so exciting to see it happening right here in my own nest box!!

It sure is exciting!

 

[sylviethecochin]

My experience with integrating chicks:
I usually isolate for two-three days after hatch so that the chicks are strong enough to follow their mother around and know her voice, (I've had chicks follow strange hens before, with predictable results) and then integrate. I've never had an issue with that. My flock is pretty easygoing, though. And by this point, they're used to chicks.

A note on roosters:
Most of them are pretty gentle towards chicks. If one isn't at least tolerant of chicks, there is something wrong with him (as wrong as if an adult rooster was mounting a pullet, or killing one of his own hens) and he would be immediately culled from my flock.

Hens are another matter, of course. But my chicks learn not to approach strange hens within a few hours of meeting the flock. I've never had one killed or even mildly injured.

Good luck!