My Ancona won't move

[P-Funk]

It's been 24 hours and she won't leave the nesting box. She tries to bite my hand when I go to check for eggs. Should I just grab her or is there a bigger underlying problem here?

 

[bruceha2000]

Broody. I bet she flattens down when you approach and "growls" at you as well. I have 2 Faverolles and they are BOTH broody. No rooster, no fertile eggs and they sit there on shavings all day no matter how often I take them off.

I need to make a "broody buster" cage and stuff them in there. The theory is if you can keep them off the nest for a few days, their "I must hatch something" hormones settle down.

Bruce

 

[P-Funk]

Thanks, Bruce. At the request of a more seasoned BYC'er I put on some gloves and removed her from the box. Sure enough there were a bunch of eggs in there and she now hates me. Yet I'm still curious too see what a 'Broody Buster' box looks like. Preston

 

[bruceha2000]

Thanks, Bruce. At the request of a more seasoned BYC'er I put on some gloves and removed her from the box. Sure enough there were a bunch of eggs in there and she now hates me. Yet I'm still curious too see what a 'Broody Buster' box looks like. Preston

I gather they can look like anything

The important thing is that they have no contact with anything resembling nesting material and there is air under them. There is no specific size but it has to be big enough for the bird(s) plus food and water.


Here is a picture of the one I built yesterday from stuff I had around. It is 4' long, 18" wide and about 22" from the top of the 1/2 hardware cloth (poultry stapled to the TOP of the bottom boards) so there is ~3.5" of air space under them. Carefully designed with very formal plans! OK, not. Carefully sized to fit the wood I had on hand

I'm going to have to take the water out at night because it will freeze.

What I don't know:
1. Will it work? Supposed to be anywhere from overnight to 4 or 5 days. The way to tell, apparently, is to let them out somewhere away from the nests and see if they go back to being "one of the girls" or if they high tail it back to the nest. It would be a lot easier if we had green stuff growing and bugs to eat outside instead of snow.

2. Should I have put it up on the roosts so there is more air under them? I posted on a broody forum and sent a note to a guy who kindly sent me info on busting those broodies.




As you might expect, they were NOT happy about being shoved in there.


update 3/4/2013: BUT - Anais stayed out of the nests all day today. Less than 24 hours in the box. Clemence was still interested in getting back is the nest so she is spending another 24 hours on the "inside".

Bruce