Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread

[ChandaMerrie]

Okay so I'm new at this.... I have a silike she is broody it's a long story but she ended up with two of her own eggs and a frizzle egg. I wasnt sure if those eggs were fertile (I don't have a rooster, but had bought some chickens at an acution when I got home I had one frizzle male had to find him a home so he was around a few days) So, anyway, I moved her and her 3 eggs inside, and I bought a few fertile eggs and put them under her. It took me about 2 weeks to find fertile eggs. All seemed well, she sits on those eggs and will not move!!! Until yesterday, now I never took the first set of eggs, and kind of forgot about them... Until I heard peep peep peep!!! They were hatching!! Two of the 3 have hatched!! SUPER SUPER CUTE!! But now what do I do? I really want the other eggs to hatch and they still have 2 weeks!! Can someone please help me!!

 

[djennings]

do u have a incubator, if not might consider taking chicks away until others hatch then giving them back to her

 

[cat1994]

I don't think that if you take the chick away and let her hatch out the rest of the eggs she will accept the old chick; she most likely will just stick with the ones that just hatched and think the other chick she hatched a while ago is now a threat

 

[Tiss]

I don't think she'll accept the 2 week old chicks either. I guess I would take the chicks as they hatch and raise them then hope she stays sitting on the other eggs to hatch them. Your only other choice would be to put the unhatched eggs in an incubator and try to hatch them- in which case, you'd still have chicks to hand raise.

Good luck!

 

[ChandaMerrie]

I tried taking the chicks away, but the only space I have for them is in a bathroom we don't use. I use the shower for my brooder, it works great, and I have a creat in the same bathroom that I use for sick chickens or for broody chickens. When I put the chicks in the shower they cheeped and cheeped and she cheeped back at them, so I put them back with her. Do you think they will stop and be okay? I have an incubator but at the moment is has 24 black copper maran eggs in it, not due to hatch for 3 weeks. I put them in on Saturday. At the moment I put the broody hen in the brooder with the babies and her eggs. I'm thinking if I move her back to the create at night maybe everyone will be okay! Any ideas? I really don't have any place else to put my broody hen. I am a mother of 5 so the rest of my house is loud.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Quote:
can you not hatch eggs that are due at different times in your incubator, I thought I had read of people hatching at different times?

 

[ChandaMerrie]

I have read that too, but I'm not sure how that works. I have read that you should not open the incubator once the chicks start to hatch, and that the humidity needs to be raised the last few days, so with that said how do you move the eggs 3 times a day, and keep the humidity higher for the ones that are hatching and lower for the ones that are not. I tried this once and lost all the chicks. I had some that started hatching almost were all the way out but ended up dead. Not sure if it's because I opened the bator to move the other eggs or something else.

 

[Miss Lydia]

Quote:
there are 2 ladies on our N.C thread that do this all the time I just posted to either one for info so hopefully one or the other will be on tonight to tell us how it can be done. they do this all the time.

 

[BHep]

Hey ChandaMerrie... ML said you needed help.....

Yes you can put the eggs in the bator, you will have a staggered hatch. Since they are only a week apart, it won't be an issue if you don't turn the eggs for a few day. Humidity shouldn't be an issue either, you only need to raise the humidy to 50-60% anyway.

Maybe I should ask these questions first:
Do you have any other broodies?
What type of Incubator?
What do you have your humidity at now?

 

[ChandaMerrie]

Thank you!! Right now I have her in the brooder, and she is sitting on the rest of her eggs with her 2 babies, it looks like the 3rd one is going to hatch too!! This is our first ever hatching!! And everyone is super excited!!!