Is my hen going broody?

[chickie fam]

For about 3 days now I have a hen that has been sitting on a nest for four or more hours after she has laid her egg but she always ends up jumping off when the other hens start bugging her too much. Is she going to go broody soon or is she just being lazy on her nest? I don't know how to tell if a hen has gone broody or not, I'm still pretty new to this

 

[AAJ]

I think that she is being lazy. if it is about twelve eggs on the nest then she might be trying to go broody.

 

[lclough1998]

If she stops laying eggs and doesnt get off the nest you will know. Do you want her to be broody, are her eggs fertile?

 

[chickie fam]

There are usually about 5 or more eggs under her when she is sitting there. I have about 3 hens that are doing this and there are at least 4 eggs under each of them. I'm really wanting them to brood but I just don't know how to encourage or even spot the signs

 

[chickie fam]

If she stops laying eggs and doesnt get off the nest you will know. Do you want her to be broody, are her eggs fertile?

I think she'd stay on the nest if the other hens would leave her alone. Their eggs are all fertile and I wish she would be broody. I don't know if there is any way to encourage her

 

[lclough1998]

I would make a nest in a dog crate with the door open and see if she stays on the eggs. Just mark the eggs you put under her so if someone does lay an egg in with hers, you will know which one or ones doesnt belong. or you can lock her up separate but make sure you take her off her nest once or twice a day to poop, eat and drink. does she put up a fuss when the other hens hop in with her? I need to leave for a bit, but will check back in a while once I get home. I love my broody hens, I have silkies and there is almost always a hen sitting on eggs at my place!

 

[chickie fam]

She starts squaking when the other hens bother her and she pecks at your hand when you reach for her. Do you know what breeds go broody most often? I've had horrible luck with incubators and I hate buying chicks when I have all these fertile eggs around here. I've contemplated buying Silkies just to have them to lay on the eggs. My goal is to to establish a sub flock of brooders just for them to lay on eggs but I'm not sure how to go about acquiring good brooders

 

[lclough1998]

I know I got my 2 silkie hens last april, they were about 9 months old and last year they each went broody 3 times each, now they have both been broody already this year. So 4 times each in less then a year. Thats pretty good, I think! I love my silkies, I only put 7 or 8 regular size eggs under each, cause I dont want there to be too many and have some accidently shoved out of the nest. Hopefully if you move her with some eggs, the other hens will stay with their routine on the regular nest boxes and leave her alone. I have one hen on eggs in the regular coop, not locked in. She runs out and eats, poops, pecks at the other birds and runs back in to her eggs, only one other silkie laying right now, and one in the garage with 8 orpington chicks she hatched out for me. It was a hassle having her in the garage but it was really bad weather when she started setting and my daughter was afraid she would leave her nest and since I had bought the eggs, I wanted her to sit tight. She has a few choc orps and lemon orps and the other hen is sitting on lemon orp eggs now. Oh what fun, can hardly wait to see if I got boys or girls....

 

[suebee]

Well my silkie screams when broody.

Watch here:

 

[chickie fam]

I was going to move her last night but we had a couple mishaps with the weather so we'll be moving her tonight to a different box. It was funny, she jumped off to go eat and get a drink and another hen jumped on her nest and she wouldn't stop screeching at all the hens in boxes. So I put a few eggs in a box that no one was using and put her in there, she moved the eggs around a little, sat down and went to sleep and I didn't hear anything else out of her for a few hours but she eventually got off her nest for the rest of the day.
I really wish there was a button you could push for them to brood. I think I'm going to seriously look into get some silkies this year