New babies and unhatched eggs

[rizabay]

Hello, we have a chicken that went broody in our coop nesting box. This is our first experience with a broody and hatching eggs. We do not have a removable nesting box and were nervous about moving her, so we left her in the coop. Our other chickens continued to lay their eggs in her box before we got the chance to mark the eggs under the broody so we ended up with eggs with multiple incubation times. She has hatched 3 eggs, 2 on Sunday and 1 yesterday. She still has 5 eggs under her and is still sitting on them. Should we let her sit on them as long as she wants or should we remove the rest of the eggs? She is taking care of the chicks as well but some of the older hens try and pick on them and I am wondering if I should move the mother and chicks to a separate box, but I don't want to get rid of viable eggs if there is still a chance for them.

 

[MommaBee]

This happened to us last week. She hatched her first one out on Wednesday night and the last one was on Sunday. We just brought her a tiny bowl of water and some chick starter as well as pellets for her. This was on day 2 of her marathon hatch and she seemed appreciative and kept right on sitting until they were all hatched out. Everything worked out fine. She got up a few times to stretch and walk the chicks around, which had us nervous because she was off the nest for over an hour. But I guess she knew what she was doing because it all worked out fine. If you get a chance, maybe do the smell test and remove any bad eggs so she doesn't sit longer than she has too?

 

[rizabay]

Is that the best way to tell if they are bad at this point? Smell test?

 

[jnewman]

If she is still sitting on the eggs, go ahead and let her keep sitting. If she reaches her limit with little ones hatched, she will get up. We have a hen who (after 5 hatched and later killed by the rooster) successfully hatched 2 chicks with no problems and decided that was her limit this season and got up off of the other 8 eggs (which I know were developing). She is doing great and is loving her first season of motherhood. Good luck with the little ones!

 

[sumi]

You could sniff them, but that is an unreliable method. I suggest candling them instead. Then you will also get an idea how far along they are, which are viable, etc. Here are some candling pics you can use as reference:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...dling-pics-progression-though-incubation/0_30

I hope she hatches some more chicks for you.

 

[rizabay]

Thank you everyone!