Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread

[FL Crowing Hen]

Thanks! I'll wail until tonight and candle one last time.

Well, I candled the two remaining eggs one last time. Since this is my very first time doing this, I was having a hard time trusting my eyes. It's one thing to read about it and look at pictures,but it's quite another to actually do it yourself. I suppose that's why I was so shocked when I went out this morning and was greeted by a chick that came out of the very egg that I had expected it to come out of. Anyway, the two remaining eggs look exactly the same way they always have looked, like a freshly laid egg. I put them in a plastic bag and cracked them open one at a time. I was terrified that maybe I had made a mistake, however once I cracked them open, they looked pretty much like any egg with a white and a yolk. Whew!

On another note, I did get 3 foster chicks. They were hatched in an incubator yesterday afternoon, so were less than 24 hours old. I tucked them under my broody about 4 hours ago, and so far everyone is doing well.

 

[Lady of McCamley]

Round 2.
I had to drive to a different store but found chicks that were hatched Thursday....the youngest I could find. California Greys again....must be a special. These look brighter than the last chick so the other may have already been experiencing transition stress.

I got 2 this time. It was dusk by the time I got home from a 30 minute drive so I placed immediately. The Queen Mum is still sitting nicely. She had shifted to the other corner and back again, but took them being placed calmly and was purring to them when I left. They had stuck, and I placed a board to force them to stay in this nest for the night so no night walking and getting lost.

Not to sound insensitive but seriously if they do not have the brains to stay with the nice warm loving hen, then they lack necessary survival skills for my flock.

LofMc

 

[fisherlady]

Not to sound insensitive but seriously if they do not have the brains to stay with the nice warm loving hen, then they lack necessary survival skills for my flock.

LofMc

I can totally understand what you mean! Glad you found her a couple more to try. Hoping it goes well this time around!

 

[vpatt]

Round 2.
I had to drive to a different store but found chicks that were hatched Thursday....the youngest I could find. California Greys again....must be a special. These look brighter than the last chick so the other may have already been experiencing transition stress.

I got 2 this time. It was dusk by the time I got home from a 30 minute drive so I placed immediately. The Queen Mum is still sitting nicely. She had shifted to the other corner and back again, but took them being placed calmly and was purring to them when I left.   They had stuck, and I placed a board to force them to stay in this nest for the night so no night walking and getting lost.

Not to sound insensitive but seriously if they do not have the brains to stay with the nice warm loving hen, then they lack necessary survival skills for my flock.

LofMc

I hope things go better this time!

 

[Lady of McCamley]

I can totally understand what you mean! Glad you found her a couple more to try. Hoping it goes well this time around!

Thank you for the encouragement (and understanding).

As always...the single OE hatchling is not only surviving but thriving. It always amazes me how the greenhouse chicks go down for the count but the hatchlings survive and thrive in all conditions. I am convinced heat lamp hatching and brooding somehow changes their growth or tolerance or something. Or the hatcheries through process of inadvertent elimination are selecting for birds that do not have good outdoor survival at young age since everyone heat lamps them.

Ah well...I am trying to perfect fostering as I can then get specific production breeds to fill out my specialty hatches... and a 90% chance of female (if the hatchery guru is good)....or 100% if I go sex links.

If I think I could get away with it, I would keep a rooster (legal, just not sure of the neighborhood waters yet...a few of them might not like the noise...never mind their loud kids). Plus I just haven't found the right rooster yet. Waiting to hatch out the right one.

Then I hope to breed my own backyard hardies. The next hatch may include some Rhodebars again (along with my missed Isbars), and my breeder has perfected her RB line so the autosexing is much better (I got a wheaten based roo last time)...I'm thinking a RB roo would be a nice addition for my 3 RB ladies. That may be my go-to breed...good layers and males are good eating before they are old enough to crow much.

LofMc

 

[bumpercarr]

Lady of McC, so glad that you were able to find some that maybe (hopefully) will stick with the broody this time. It is so discouraging when you do everything you can to foster these chicks and then lose them. I hope all goes well, truly.


I'm glad you brought up the subject of viability and I will apologize in advance for any that I may insult with this rant. I read on various threads about trimming butt feathers to ensure fertilization, babysitting our broodies, worrying about flock dynamics, and on and on it goes. One of the things that we don't talk about much is viability...for instance, if a chick is not smart enough to seek warmth, is this a chick that we want to produce offspring that are also not smart enough to seek warmth? I believe strongly that the chickens we produce MUST have a strong instinct to survive, we do ourselves a disservice if we "baby" our chicks, our flocks and our breeding programs to ensure a great hatch rate, but not a great survival instinct. The survival instinct needs to be part of what we are looking for in the breeding programs that we all are developing...after all, if our birds cannot breed naturally, hatch naturally and survive with an inherent respect for predators and ability to seek sustenance; are we simply breeding these chickens for our own enjoyment or are we looking to a time in the future that we need to ensure the survival of these breeds and perhaps our own survival with renewable food resource?

Sorry for the latest rants...maybe I'm in a bad mood lately...................

 

[Lady of McCamley]

Lady of McC, so glad that you were able to find some that maybe (hopefully) will stick with the broody this time. It is so discouraging when you do everything you can to foster these chicks and then lose them. I hope all goes well, truly.


I'm glad you brought up the subject of viability and I will apologize in advance for any that I may insult with this rant. I read on various threads about trimming butt feathers to ensure fertilization, babysitting our broodies, worrying about flock dynamics, and on and on it goes. One of the things that we don't talk about much is viability...for instance, if a chick is not smart enough to seek warmth, is this a chick that we want to produce offspring that are also not smart enough to seek warmth? I believe strongly that the chickens we produce MUST have a strong instinct to survive, we do ourselves a disservice if we "baby" our chicks, our flocks and our breeding programs to ensure a great hatch rate, but not a great survival instinct. The survival instinct needs to be part of what we are looking for in the breeding programs that we all are developing...after all, if our birds cannot breed naturally, hatch naturally and survive with an inherent respect for predators and ability to seek sustenance; are we simply breeding these chickens for our own enjoyment or are we looking to a time in the future that we need to ensure the survival of these breeds and perhaps our own survival with renewable food resource?

Sorry for the latest rants...maybe I'm in a bad mood lately...................

Thank you. You bring up EXACTLY what I am thinking....I feel so bad when something happens to one of my flock members, but if I am using good husbandry practices, there comes a point that if the bird isn't smart enough to take care of itself, when it has the tools to do so, then maybe it should be culled by its own actions.

While neither one of us is trying to be cavalier or heartless to the animals under our care, I do believe there is a point that "enough is enough." They either step up to the challenge or simply are not worth the effort of sustaining them.

And that leads to my original premise....the hatcheries are not breeding for small farm old fashioned sustainability...they breed for caged existence...artificial environments where they produce lots of eggs. I am in the process of seeing if any of those hatchery breeds will transition as chicks to natural circumstances (broody fostered with no artificial heat). It certainly isn't impossible as the broody hatched chicks prove how very possible it is...the hatchlings THRIVE in the conditions. And I need chicks that will grow into hens that will do so. (I just read an interesting article from a sustainability farming blog where this farm let their store bought chickens set and hatch chicks. Only about 20% of the hatched chicks survived that first year. After that, those survivors set and had chicks...ALL survived for the following year...and the next 3 years...showing a natural selection process of old fashioned sustainability.)

My flock gets lots of exercise and yes our Oregon elements. So they need to be hardy to endure our wet humid cold, which, while less extreme in temps, many have said is worse than the dry cold in the midwest and east. We get the dank cold you feel in your bones. (If you read the journals of Lewis and Clark, our winters even got on THEIR nerves.) If the chicks can't handle that as chicks, in a protected enclosure, they won't sustain long as adults in the open yard. I have noticed how my broody hatchlings grow up to be my best and earliest layers and much stronger hens than those that I heat brooded....but my hatchlings have all come from breeder or backyard lines locally. They are un-phased by the elements even though they have the opportunity to get out of the rain.

Thanks for seeing what I am thinking.
LofMc

 

[bumpercarr]

LofMcC, thanks for validating my thoughts. I am very into heritage breeds, which is why I have chosen Brahmas as my breed (although it is certainly not the only breed that can be viable as heritage breed). I'm sometimes discouraged when I read other thoughts....how to ensure a good hatch, good fertility rate, good broody moms. I prefer things to be as natural as possible. I love each and every one of my chickens, but at the same time I seriously evaluate each one for viability...which cockerel or cock that I have is desperate to breed, which pullet is broody and wants to raise its young, which chicks withstand the cold/heat/various infections that come along as being part of the flock, and which pairings of cocks/hens produce the most viable chicks. On top of all of that, I'm looking for type and color and pattern. Sometimes it is simply mind boggling. But all of those things go into determining which pairs to breed, which chicks/hens/cockerels to keep or cull and how to ensure that I have a sustainable flock. It is often very hard to accept the losses that occur, but at the same time I have to remember that if I lose one (chick, hen or any chicken for that matter) it is often for the best.

Anyway, good luck with your fosters...hope it works out for you. If not, I've watched mommas with singles and they do fine. Not as well as those that have some hatchmates to develop with and to bond with, but still they do fine.

 

[bramblefir]

The discussion about survivability is excellent. Our first broody (hatchery Langshan) hatched out 13 chicks and we had 3 die their first day out and about (yesterday). Two failed to follow her out of the coop and one followed her into the brush to forage and didn't come back out. A 4th chick had followed her into the run, got separated somehow, and was very near death when I found it. I tucked it into my bra, finished up my chores, and ended up taking it down to the house because it had started to revive. A couple of minutes in the incubator and it was walking around peeping loudly. I gave the chick back to the broody and we'll see what it does with it's second, and last, chance at life. It won't have any more coddling from me, it's had enough already.

Mother Nature - sometimes she's wonderful, sometimes she's a witch, and sometimes she's doing us a favor without us realizing it.

 

[ShinShien]

Update on the broody who pooped on her eggs. I candled the eggs yesterday, and all eight have blood vessels in them. I'm sure that's a good sign. One egg still has some dried poop on it, and about four are stained.