Moving a setting hen?

[acsinos]

@Acsinos - Thanks for sharing your experience with foreign chicks. I have had success in the past adding purchased day (or two) old chicks to the newly hatched chicks with no harm to the birds, but I have always done so within 48 hours of hatch, and then hold my breath. I have heard that the opposite can happen as well, as in your case. I am expecting hatched chicks on June 3, and have an order of day old chicks arriving on June 4. I was going to try and pawn some of the hatchery chicks off on the new mama since she's already signedo n for the job . I may rethink this since she can't take them all in and I will need to run a light for some of them anyway.

In the past I have I separated out my setting hen in a rabbit pen - 8'x4'x4' and let her raise the chicks until she's finished -- 6 -10 weeks. Then I add them to the immediate flock which is a half dozen Nankin bantams. They bully, but I haven't had a lot of drama, and no injuries, so far. Might be dumb luck. Shifting around stock is always stressful on the birds (and me!). I don't introduce the growing chicks to the entire flock until they are pert near grown. What has your experience been with this?

We have a cooped run with laying hens (wyandottes, RIR, Easter Eggers, etc) and then we have the free rangers (everything from old english game to silkies). I had two Partridge Rock pullets I added to the coop this year when they were about 13 weeks and you would have thought it was the end of the world! I kept the two new girls in a pen INSIDE the coop run and the existing hens still hated the new ones. I would let the new girls out while I was feeding (where I could supervise) and usually I would have to repen them within 5-10 minutes because of bullying. Finally, I decided at 16 weeks, the new girls were too big to be double cooped and I turned them out in the main coop. I had to kick out some of the older hens for a day or two to reset the pecking order. The new girls still get a peck or two now and then, but they settled in. I don’t think I can trust my coop ladies with babies…I am pretty sure those hens would kill chicks. I’ve had a few of the small chicks from the outside flock sneak in to the coop while I was cleaning, hoping for some goodies, and after a few minutes of torture from the hens, find the nearest exit!

On the free range flock, I pretty much put the babies on the ground at 4 weeks (weather permitting). I have a nursery where I coop them a night to prevent predator attacks, but the little ones mingle with the adults during the day, no problem. We have lots of space, so I don’t think anyone ever feels cornered. Sometimes the roosters get a little over zealous chasing the young hens, and I have to isolate the roos for a day or two, but it works itself out. My issues have really only been where the hens are 100% cooped and the new chickens can’t run far enough away to escape.

 

[acsinos]

I had 2 bantams nesting side by side in separate nests. When the first eggs hatched the hens fought over the chicks and the chicks were the losers. Since then I always move my broody hens. I do it at night. All my nest boxes are portable so I move hen, eggs and nest all together. I have also put day old chicks under my broody hens when I didn't want them to sit on their own eggs I . I have never had a problem doing this. I do this at night also.

Interesting. I had the same thing (2 silver duckwing old english game bantams nesting side by side in the same pet carrier) but these ladies were sisters. They went broody the same day and hatched all their chicks within 5 hours of each other. I penned them and the babies together and they "co-mama-ed". Between the two, they had 6 chicks. They never fought over them at all, just fought me when i tried to clean their pen and feed them or handle the babies!

Once the babies were grown up, these ladies were back out with their rooster, together. I was amazed to see two broody mamas get along so well.

 

[Cass]

I've experienced everything everyone has written about. Low egg counts with broodies in the coop? Yup. They pick back up. Sometimes that low egg count is due to the non-broody hens laying eggs in the broody's nest. Have to mark the eggs you want to hatch and remove extras daily. Doing so can be hazardous to your hands, but it has to be done. Wear thick gloves and try not to touch the marked eggs to avoid contamination from germs on your hands. (Yes they get germs from the hens, but those are chicken germs, not human germs...there is a difference to a developing egg)

Broody is favorite nest box? Of course, they want to accumulate as many eggs as possible, so they choose to sit where everyone chooses to lay. See above.

Nest box to far from ground? No problem. Day 18-19 move the whole nest box to a lower location. She won't abandon them, since by then the eggs will be peeping and rocking. Nest box won't move? Let her hatch up there but put something around the box to keep chicks in nest until 2 days after first chick hatches. (Chicken wire is pretty moldable) Once they hatch she will bring them down and find a place on the floor each night to sleep with them. A dish pan in the corner filled with whatever you use on your floor works well. The chicks can hop in and out of a dish pan at 2 days of age.

Co-parenting. It's cute to watch unless one is aggressive. When that happens I take a few chicks and move the aggressive hen away from the more docile parent. I have 2 coops, so I can do that.

Putting chicks under a broody sitting on non-fertile eggs? Wait til dark (love my hat with a light) and slip them under her, while removing eggs. This only works if she has been sitting almost the full time. I had a hen kill a chick (I rescued the other 2) because I rushed her into motherhood. She had only been sitting about 10 days so she knew they weren't her chicks. Aim for after day 18. Not sure when Day 18+ is? Better to wait to long than too short a time. I have had hens sit for 28 days trying to hatch eggs that just wouldn't cooperate. Actually I had one hen sit 42 days to get chicks. First batch didn't hatch, second batch hatched ONE chick. (Darn rooster. He must have been having an off month)

Moving a broody? With some hens it works, with some it doesn't. You have to decide if the value of the eggs she is sitting on and if moving her doesn't work how upset you will be to not have that clutch hatch. I don't move a broody unless it is absolutely necessary....I try to cover HER area with chicken wire or a cat box lid or something to protect her and only move her if nothing else works.

 

[LaynaDon95]

I don't know if you've decided what to do or not yet, as I don't have time to read through the whole thread, but here's my best advice. I have 4 hens raising chicks and 2 hens sitting right now. I haven't had much problem with the hens bullying the broodies (except the silkies, they love to beat up on the silkies) but the other hens will climb into the nesting box with the broody and "donate" eggs. It's very annoying because I end up with eggs a week or 2 behind in development and have to incubate them. Plus once the chicks hatch the other hens will kill the babies. I had 2 get trampled/pecked to death. It was very sad, and I decide to always move broodies out of the coop from then on.
I just get an old sheet and cover the whole nesting box. (which is a bucket, so I can move the whole thing.) I leave it there for a couple hours, so they get used to being covered. Then I move their entire nesting box to the broody room, with the sheet still covering them. Once it's dark I take the sheet off, and by morning they even know they've been moved. It's worked on 5 hens so far. You'd have to use a slightly different tactic, because your nesting boxes aren't portable, but that's the idea.

 

[dmboyett]

If you are careful with the eggs you can move them. If you move them by hand or in a container just make sure they aren't rolled, jostled or shaken during the move. I've had a lot of broody hens that I had to move with their eggs and they all hatched out fine.

 

[chickadee101]

i need to move my hen too, because about a week ago, 2 of my hens got broody, and today i found out a snake ate all of one of the hens eggs... but the other still has SOME left, so i need to move her to a snake-free place.

 

[brairgirl]

We don't move our broodys. They stay with the flock because it makes it better for integration later. I have actually seen the *mean rooster (like to try to attack people, sometime succeeding), protect a broodies chicks from the adults.. But we have 2 chicken wired areas in the coop to put broodys and their babies in case she isn't protecting them well enough. But in the future we will have a room for broodies and their babies.




*This rooster is named Thighs, and he will be delicious!

 

[LaynaDon95]

If you are careful with the eggs you can move them. If you move them by hand or in a container just make sure they aren't rolled, jostled or shaken during the move. I've had a lot of broody hens that I had to move with their eggs and they all hatched out fine.

Eggs are a lot tougher than most people think. I've found that out the stressful way. One of the most stressful was when my duck decided to sit. She had about 8 eggs. The hens bullied her like crazy. The rolled her eggs out from underneath her (some of them I didn't find for hours) so I moved her to a tractor on the other side of the yard. She wouldn't accept the new nest, and stayed off of it all night, trying to get back to the old one, in 40 degree weather. I found the eggs stone cold the next morning. I candled them and they were congealed and nasty inside. Nevertheless I moved them back to the old nest and the duck resumed sitting and on. Then fire ants got in the nest and I had to move them AGAIN to the incubator to keep them from being eaten. All but 1 hatched out beautifully. The other was severely deformed (due to a lopsided air cell), and had to be culled.

That's just one of many stories. I've made TONS of noob mistakes and the eggs don't seem to be any worse off for it.

 

[Moonkit]

I've always moved my hens out of the coop when I'm going to let them set on fertile eggs.. but I think the success in doing so has alot to do with how much the hens are used to being handled. I'm very hands on with my hens... picking them up, carrying them, hand feeding, etc.. so for my broodies, me picking them up is an annoyance, but not a catastrophe or heralding the apocolypse. I've even carried a broody around in her nest box during the day while I was prepping the dog crate to move her into. Another time, I carried two bantams, one in each hand, for 10 minutes while my dad finished prepping a dog crate. They both stayed perfectly calm, legs and wings dangling as they rested in my hands, waiting to be put on whatever nest I was moving them to.

Of the past 4 clutches my hens have set and hatched, I only had 1 abandon the idea after being moved... but since I had 3 other broodies at the time, they easily took her eggs with their own.

I currently have four sitting in three nest boxes (2 of the bantams paired up, and I didn't see a reason to split the pair) in a temporary dog pen on the porch filled with sand and sweet pdz. Hatching should begin this Saturday! Go chickies go!

 

[magichen]

i had the same problem and i moved her at night 2 days agoa on her 7th day of sitting on 10 fertile eggs first i lifted her of the nest and took the eggs to the nest i had made for her then i just lifted her to the coop and she sat tight all night and only takes 1 break a day