Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread

[Sydney Acres]

ETA.... I have a chick!!! YIPPEE!!

Ahhh, she's so cute!!! That was quick. You posted while I was writing to you.

 

[Sydney Acres]

Quote: I think you trim below the vent on the roosters, and above the vent on the hens.

I have to agree with TeaChick about the ratios, but would like to expand a bit on the housing arrangement and breeding management.

If you have 3 hens with 4 roosters, that's three too many roosters. In that type of hen:rooster ratio, the hens are horribly overbred, but the breeding is rarely successful because the roosters are so competitive. They knock each other off the hens, or they fight on top of the hens, or they triple stack, or any number of other things. They try to breed so quickly that they can't get the job done, and the hens are stressed out to the max. Hopefully, the hens don't get injured too severely, but they almost always get scratches and other wounds under the feathers, when they have any feathers left. But realistically, they're miserable, day after day after day.

If, on the other hand, you have 3 hens to each of 4 roosters, so 12 hens total, then there could still be a problem, depending on how you have them housed. You have the potential to have 4 separate quads, 3 hens to each rooster, which would work well. The emphasis for success here is separate. Multiple males together only work in certain circumstances, and even then two males together is usually the maximum, especially if they are the same age. When there are 4 males together, all the same age, they don't look over the chicken yard and say, "OK, let's decide who gets who -- I'll take the 3 girls on the right, you take the ones by the waterer, you take the ones that are eating, and you take the ones on the left." They're just not that organized!! Each rooster wants ALL the hens for himself. So you're back to the same problem as if you only had 3 hens, but now there's just more hens to dilute out the misery of being with 4 roosters at the same time.

There are, of course, exceptions. I have three roosters sharing a two acre yard with 19 hens, but it didn't start out that way. Two of the roosters and 5 of the hens are very elderly. The original 7 were inherited as an established and bonded flock from my father-in-law. Even though the ratio was quite rooster heavy, the two roosters had long ago worked out everything between them, and the submissive rooster was not allowed to breed the hens. If he tried, the dominant rooster knocked him off and disciplined him, and that was a very rare event. The flock had a large and interesting area to roam, so no one was stressed or injured. When the original flock was 4 years old, I added 14 hens and one rooster, of a totally different breed from the original flock. When the young rooster was about 5 months old, the dominant older rooster had a long "talk" with him over a few days, and that settled out all issues. By the time the young flock was breeding, the young rooster knew not to even consider approaching the older hens, and the older roosters had no interest in the younger hens (which really surprised me, but some chickens like to stay with their own kind). Everyone had plenty of room to spread out and plenty of things to do, and they returned to separate coops at night, so sharing a free range environment was not a problem. But this is the exception, and probably only worked because the dominant rooster was old enough to have some judgment but still young enough to enforce it when the young rooster came around. Now that the dominant rooster is 6 years old and arthritic and the young rooster is 2 years old and in the prime of life, the social balance may change soon, but so far the younger rooster is still quite respectful of the older one. Again, more the exception than the rule, possibly because they have so much room, so much cover, and have their own, well-established harems. Really, what's there to fight over???

So if you have 3 hens per rooster, you probably need to give each quad its own setup to get decent fertility. While that may take up a lot of space and be a lot of work, there are huge advantages. First, your birds, both the roosters and the hens, will have a much better quality of life. The hens won't be constantly mauled by competing males, and the males won't be constantly trying to outdo each other, so they can strut around all happy as the king of their own little harem. Second, you'll be able to have a much better breeding program. If all hens are breeding with all roosters, you have no way to even know if one of your males is sterile, much less evaluate the genetics of any of your birds to select for improvement. It's just a free-for-all where you hope you get some nice chicks, but you have no way to influence the process.

If, on the other hand, you have 3 hens total with four rooster, you really need to either get rid of some of those roosters, or get a lot more hens and set up trios or quads. Since you're on the broody thread, I should add that it would be extremely difficult for a broody to incubate a clutch with 4 roosters stirring around, and only 2 remaining hens to keep them occupied. In all likelihood the gang of roosters would be repeatedly jumping on the broody, or at least stressing her out to the point that she leaves the nest prematurely, so even if you had all fertile eggs they wouldn't hatch in that scenario.

 

[bumpercarr]

I think you trim below the vent on the roosters, and above the vent on the hens.

I have to agree with TeaChick about the ratios, but would like to expand a bit on the housing arrangement and breeding management.

If you have 3 hens with 4 roosters, that's three too many roosters. In that type of hen:rooster ratio, the hens are horribly overbred, but the breeding is rarely successful because the roosters are so competitive. They knock each other off the hens, or they fight on top of the hens, or they triple stack, or any number of other things. They try to breed so quickly that they can't get the job done, and the hens are stressed out to the max. Hopefully, the hens don't get injured too severely, but they almost always get scratches and other wounds under the feathers, when they have any feathers left. But realistically, they're miserable, day after day after day.

If, on the other hand, you have 3 hens to each of 4 roosters, so 12 hens total, then there could still be a problem, depending on how you have them housed. You have the potential to have 4 separate quads, 3 hens to each rooster, which would work well. The emphasis for success here is separate. Multiple males together only work in certain circumstances, and even then two males together is usually the maximum, especially if they are the same age. When there are 4 males together, all the same age, they don't look over the chicken yard and say, "OK, let's decide who gets who -- I'll take the 3 girls on the right, you take the ones by the waterer, you take the ones that are eating, and you take the ones on the left." They're just not that organized!! Each rooster wants ALL the hens for himself. So you're back to the same problem as if you only had 3 hens, but now there's just more hens to dilute out the misery of being with 4 roosters at the same time.

There are, of course, exceptions. I have three roosters sharing a two acre yard with 19 hens, but it didn't start out that way. Two of the roosters and 5 of the hens are very elderly. The original 7 were inherited as an established and bonded flock from my father-in-law. Even though the ratio was quite rooster heavy, the two roosters had long ago worked out everything between them, and the submissive rooster was not allowed to breed the hens. If he tried, the dominant rooster knocked him off and disciplined him, and that was a very rare event. The flock had a large and interesting area to roam, so no one was stressed or injured. When the original flock was 4 years old, I added 14 hens and one rooster, of a totally different breed from the original flock. When the young rooster was about 5 months old, the dominant older rooster had a long "talk" with him over a few days, and that settled out all issues. By the time the young flock was breeding, the young rooster knew not to even consider approaching the older hens, and the older roosters had no interest in the younger hens (which really surprised me, but some chickens like to stay with their own kind). Everyone had plenty of room to spread out and plenty of things to do, and they returned to separate coops at night, so sharing a free range environment was not a problem. But this is the exception, and probably only worked because the dominant rooster was old enough to have some judgment but still young enough to enforce it when the young rooster came around. Now that the dominant rooster is 6 years old and arthritic and the young rooster is 2 years old and in the prime of life, the social balance may change soon, but so far the younger rooster is still quite respectful of the older one. Again, more the exception than the rule, possibly because they have so much room, so much cover, and have their own, well-established harems. Really, what's there to fight over???

So if you have 3 hens per rooster, you probably need to give each quad its own setup to get decent fertility. While that may take up a lot of space and be a lot of work, there are huge advantages. First, your birds, both the roosters and the hens, will have a much better quality of life. The hens won't be constantly mauled by competing males, and the males won't be constantly trying to outdo each other, so they can strut around all happy as the king of their own little harem. Second, you'll be able to have a much better breeding program. If all hens are breeding with all roosters, you have no way to even know if one of your males is sterile, much less evaluate the genetics of any of your birds to select for improvement. It's just a free-for-all where you hope you get some nice chicks, but you have no way to influence the process.

If, on the other hand, you have 3 hens total with four rooster, you really need to either get rid of some of those roosters, or get a lot more hens and set up trios or quads. Since you're on the broody thread, I should add that it would be extremely difficult for a broody to incubate a clutch with 4 roosters stirring around, and only 2 remaining hens to keep them occupied. In all likelihood the gang of roosters would be repeatedly jumping on the broody, or at least stressing her out to the point that she leaves the nest prematurely, so even if you had all fertile eggs they wouldn't hatch in that scenario.

X2

 

[Sydney Acres]

Quote:
Yes, 20 is a very full nest!! Please post again to let us know how many hatch. Also, what breed is your broody, is she large fowl or bantum, and is she setting on her own eggs or eggs from multiple hens of the same breed, or other types of eggs.

There are exceptions to every rule, but I've been told that a hen should only be on as many eggs as she can comfortably cover, and has the experience to cover. Anything more than that leads to a poor hatch. For first time broodies, I've been told the maximum should be anywhere from 6-8 eggs, and for experienced broodies it depends on their size and their attention to detail.

The problem with too many eggs is that eggs need to be rotated, and therefore they get moved around. An inexperienced broody might not keep track of which eggs she has rolled, so there can be some problems with forgotten eggs not being moved around properly. With large numbers of eggs that "barely fit," the ones in the middle stay nice and warm but the ones on the edge don't maintain adequate temperature for development. If the temp stays too low for too long, then the embryos on the edge die. Logic would say, "Well, that's sad, but at least we tried, and if the egg hadn't been under the hen it wouldn't have hatched either, so what's the harm in trying?" The problem is that the eggs get rotated around. So if being left on the edge kills an embryo after 6 hours (for example, it could be less in cool temps), and the majority of the eggs end up taking their turn on the edge at least once over the 21 days of incubation, then the majority of the eggs would die. The only ones that would hatch are the ones that never got rotated to the periphery. That could be a pretty low hatch rate, sometimes as low as zero. On the other hand, if you only had 12 eggs instead of 20 for an experienced broody, there is the potential that all 12 could hatch, since none would be pushed so far to the edge that they would remain cool for an extended time.

Since you're already on day 14, it would be a good idea to candle all the eggs to see which embryos are still alive. If they are all still alive, that'd be fabulous and there's no reason to change anything. But if some are dead and some are alive, it would be very important to remove the dead ones. That would possibly decrease the size of the nest enough that the broody could cover all the remaining eggs fully, not just barely, and give those embryos a much better chance to fully develop and hatch.

Sorry, I know 20 eggs under a broody is exciting. But this is likely a situation where bigger is definitely not better.

 

[Sydney Acres]

Quote: Thank you Bumpercarr. And welcome back!! I'm glad you didn't stay gone too long.

 

[member 129538]

I've been trying to get one of my hens to go broody to hatch some eggs. I'd be happy for any one of them to go broody at this point but I believe my Australorp is thinking about. I noticed she's been spending 4+ hours in the nest box everyday pulling out her belly feathers. She leaves the nest box and goes back to the flock though. This evening I put 8 eggs and all her feathers in one nest and added a curtain to it (half open so she knows she can go in). Will these things help? What else can I do to encourage her?

 

[bumpercarr]

Thank you Bumpercarr. And welcome back!! I'm glad you didn't stay gone too long.

Thanks. Just keeping an eye on things over here. Maybe the 8 month old brahma pullet that I'm trying to save will be my next broody.

She's doing much better, but still not out of the woods.

 

[MargaretYakoda]

Yes, 20 is a very full nest!! Please post again to let us know how many hatch. Also, what breed is your broody, is she large fowl or bantum, and is she setting on her own eggs or eggs from multiple hens of the same breed, or other types of eggs.

There are exceptions to every rule, but I've been told that a hen should only be on as many eggs as she can comfortably cover, and has the experience to cover. Anything more than that leads to a poor hatch. For first time broodies, I've been told the maximum should be anywhere from 6-8 eggs, and for experienced broodies it depends on their size and their attention to detail.

The problem with too many eggs is that eggs need to be rotated, and therefore they get moved around. An inexperienced broody might not keep track of which eggs she has rolled, so there can be some problems with forgotten eggs not being moved around properly. With large numbers of eggs that "barely fit," the ones in the middle stay nice and warm but the ones on the edge don't maintain adequate temperature for development. If the temp stays too low for too long, then the embryos on the edge die. Logic would say, "Well, that's sad, but at least we tried, and if the egg hadn't been under the hen it wouldn't have hatched either, so what's the harm in trying?" The problem is that the eggs get rotated around. So if being left on the edge kills an embryo after 6 hours (for example, it could be less in cool temps), and the majority of the eggs end up taking their turn on the edge at least once over the 21 days of incubation, then the majority of the eggs would die. The only ones that would hatch are the ones that never got rotated to the periphery. That could be a pretty low hatch rate, sometimes as low as zero. On the other hand, if you only had 12 eggs instead of 20 for an experienced broody, there is the potential that all 12 could hatch, since none would be pushed so far to the edge that they would remain cool for an extended time.

Since you're already on day 14, it would be a good idea to candle all the eggs to see which embryos are still alive. If they are all still alive, that'd be fabulous and there's no reason to change anything. But if some are dead and some are alive, it would be very important to remove the dead ones. That would possibly decrease the size of the nest enough that the broody could cover all the remaining eggs fully, not just barely, and give those embryos a much better chance to fully develop and hatch.

Sorry, I know 20 eggs under a broody is exciting. But this is likely a situation where bigger is definitely not better.

Our broody is on day fourteen with eleven eggs. We candled on Tuesday and every egg looked good then. But you're saying, with a first time broody eleven is pushing it. So when we candle on Monday or Tuesday I guess there's a better than even chance that some eggs won't be viable? On the other hand if they all hatch, then perhaps we've got a professional grade broody in training? After the first few days I haven't noticed eggs sticking out at all, really. So, there's hope, eh?

And, truth is, on the second day I noticed she wasn't able to keep all the eggs under her, so I pulled two out and fed them to the dog. And then my partner decided randomly to stick two new eggs under her but didn't tell me until the next day. So maybe her skills got a bit better? I did gently chide partner about sticking eggs under her. So if all the eggs hatch, two will be considerably later than the others.

 

[fisherlady]

ETA.... I have a chick!!! YIPPEE!!

Awesome!! Congrats!

 

[Sydney Acres]

Quote:
Don't lose hope. Chickens are incredibly tough. If you can just keep her eating and keep her crop moving the odds are in your favor. Keep us posted. All fingers and toes are crossed for you.