Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread

[NellaBean]

I had a chick tangled up in the hen's chest feathers the other day and getting strangled. So strange! It is fine now.

Here are 12 of the 14 that have hatched so far.

Number 13 and 14

There is one egg left in this batch. My super duper evil broody is on another 12 eggs, due in about a week and a half.

Chicks. Everywhere.

 

[CayuseRanch]

Seems like a pretty good hatch rate to me!

 

[hokankai]

Just as an FYI, freak accident chick is doing just fine and was seen jumping onto mommy's back this evening

. I think I'm going to groom Molly tomorrow and attempt to remove the poop in her feathers to prevent this from happening again.

 

[Fuffy]

Glad to see everyone is coming along just fine

What cute babies you all have!

And the pic of the broody in 'the zone' is priceless!

Over here, Hermione is still sitting tight on all 12 of her eggs.

She had 2 eggs just peeping out from under her breat feathers this morning. But she tucked them away oh so carefully while I watched.

So it would seem that a dozen eggs is a doable number for a little silkie cross.

 

[stonykill]

Quote:
16 from 3 broody's so far.

 

[featherz]

Well, three BO's out in the incubator so far, with more pips. I am anxious to put them under my broody, but I know I have to wait until nighttime.. /sigh.

 

[Monkie_777]

Quote:
Hello there,

We have two silkies hatching out a total of 11 silkie eggs. Our silkies have been picked up and moved photographed and they have been outstanding about it all. So far they have hatched out 5 eggs yesterday. No-one else is peeping yet. I candeled about an hour ago and at least 4 are definatly still developing maybe later today or tommorow...Hmmmm. No sure about the other two. I have two DDs and they love holding the baby chicks already. Good Luck

 

[glenstorm]

So I received my Mottled Java eggs yesterday. I had setup a dog crate with pine/cedar shavings and a nesting box. I moved my broody into the new accomodations last night and she seemed to acclimate after figuring out there was a nest full of eggs inside. She collected the eggs under her and settled down for the night. This morning I went to check on her and she was off the nest. Unfortunately, I don't know how long she was off. Anyhow I let her out and she took a stroll around the yard then went into the main coop and settled on the nest there. I retrieved her and placed her back in the hatching space, but she wouldn't sit on the eggs. I took the fertile eggs and put them in the main coop and she took them in.

What should I do? Leave her in the coop with eggs? Try to move her again tonight? I read that wood shavings are preferred to straw and straw is in the coop.

The other part of the situation is there are two broody's and they seemed to be sharing the nest.

Thanks,
Dan

 

[CayuseRanch]

Hi Glen, I am really new to this as well so hopefully someone else will come along and answer. I just now have my first broody and will be putting eggs under her tonight. After hovering and watching this thread for several months and other comments made on the BYC, I decided to leave my broody in the main coop instead of trying to move her while she is broody. It seems as if a lot of people have problems moving the broody. So I will let her hatch out in place, then after it appears that they have all hatched I will move them to a broody area that I am currently building away from the main flock. When they start to hatch, I may try and rig something up to keep any little ones from falling off the nesting boxes for the first 24 hours or so.

This is my personal preference, untried and untested choice, so please take that for what it is worth and hopefully someone with more experience will jump in.

 

[CayuseRanch]

Oh and

Glen!