Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread

[Johnn]

Heres more size pics Bobbiechicks


One of my broodies (which is the above chicks mother) has moved her nest again!! She has moved it from the back corner of the shed, to the middle of the shed, to under the other hens nest box and now she has moved it infront of the pop hole! At least she takes the egg with her!

Heres one of the chicks waiting for their sister (obviously different breeds but it was the hens above chick from last year), Bella to lay her egg!

 

[bobbieschicks]

Heres more size pics Bobbiechicks One of my broodies (which is the above chicks mother) has moved her nest again!! She has moved it from the back corner of the shed, to the middle of the shed, to under the other hens nest box and now she has moved it infront of the pop hole! At least she takes the egg with her! Heres one of the chicks waiting for their sister (obviously different breeds but it was the hens above chick from last year), Bella to lay her egg!

They are beautiful. Looks right on size to me.

 

[bobbieschicks]

I was worried about that too but we just had excessive heat waves while my silkie was sitting and look what we got yesterday!!! I let my silkie Cloud sit on 4 of her own eggs. At the time, the only roo available was the blue silkie as our cochin started mounting the girls after she started sitting. So, these are pure silkies, though they are only hatchery quality. I candled a while back and one ended up being a dud - not even fertilized. The other 3 were developing. Well, one hatched yesterday!! The cool thing is that I went out to check on her, lifted her up and actually saw the first pip happen in those few seconds! I left them alone for a while, then snuck a peek later and then again today. Was a little worried about the other two but I gently held one of the eggs to my ear and could hear movement and peeping inside! Yay! She (Cloud) is such a sweetie - never pecked me once during her whole broody time or even when I wanted to see her new baby. Here's some photos.... 1st pip Hatched! All fluffed up... Discovered the chick starter left in there for mom... Hopefully tomorrow I'll have 2 more babies to show!! Now for a question??? I have big rubber bowls for water for my 16 other hens and 2 roos (1 silkie, 1 huge cochin) and also feed them a whole grain mash grower feed. Do you think it would just be easiest to place mama and the 3 babies (still waiting for the other 2 to hatch) in the grow-out pen for a few weeks to make sure they don't get the wrong feed, fall in the water, or get stepped on by my huge cochin - LOL???

Adorable! I love my silky chicks and silky mixed chicks, they are the sweetest little things. That black one will be your cockerel. If you are feeding grower, then I wouldn't move them, they can eat the grower. It's probably a start and grow? You can also provide a bowl of non medicated chick starter around for them to nibble on. I've noticed my chicks don't eat a lot of chick feed, they scratch the ground with mom more, and my chickens tend to know the right feed to eat. They may try the others feed, but they only eat the one that's for them, it's very intriguing how they know. I leave everyone together, offer starter grower as the feed and have a bowl of oyster shells for the older ones to nibble. I've not had a problem with bigs stepping on littles, the problem is the littles that think they are big and try to boss around the older ones. And generally the older ones just ignore it or one peck and they leave them alone.

 

[Johnn]

They are beautiful. Looks right on size to me.

Thanks! and good, I couldn't remember how big Bella and Asparagus where at that age, so I was just abit worried because they looked small!

 

[Johnn]

Hopefully have some day olds lined up if the broodies fail. Just hoping I will be able to get them at night as I have no where to put them through the day!

 

[jesirose]

Awwww

 

[countrygirl74]

Adorable! I love my silky chicks and silky mixed chicks, they are the sweetest little things. That black one will be your cockerel.

If you are feeding grower, then I wouldn't move them, they can eat the grower. It's probably a start and grow? You can also provide a bowl of non medicated chick starter around for them to nibble on.

I've noticed my chicks don't eat a lot of chick feed, they scratch the ground with mom more, and my chickens tend to know the right feed to eat. They may try the others feed, but they only eat the one that's for them, it's very intriguing how they know. I leave everyone together, offer starter grower as the feed and have a bowl of oyster shells for the older ones to nibble.

I've not had a problem with bigs stepping on littles, the problem is the littles that think they are big and try to boss around the older ones. And generally the older ones just ignore it or one peck and they leave them alone.

Thanks for the info!!!!


Got 2 more new babies today!!! All 3 looking happy and healthy - hatchery quality, but still cute to me!


Chick on far right is the one who hatched Sunday - one on far left just hatched, and one still in egg...


This is the one that came out of that last egg - really pretty!


Next is a sequence - mama Cloud was a little concerned about the babies being too far from her getting their photos taken, so she called them back and one of them got scolded...

The proud daddy...

 

[delisha]

A few moms this summer





Baby's together

 

[Johnn]

A few moms this summer





Baby's together

Wow your hen in the top pic has done well if she is the breed I think she is!! (Warren, Gingernut ranger. Just that type)

 

[monaname]

Need some encouragement. My DH asked if we could let one of our broody hens hatch her eggs. I really didn't want to, but he wanted to see what would happen... So this is what happened, she hatched out two cute little chicks and then left the nest. The remaining eggs got pretty cold. One egg had a little one pecking on the inside. The next day, no pecking, no hatching

. We removed the remaining eggs. The two chicks were alright with the general population for about a day. Then one was found dead. The other was just fine. A week later, (this morning) I found the other dead in the run. It had been happy and healthy and the others didn't seem to care. I free range the flock for about 80% of the day, so mom and chick were mostly left alone. I suspect that the little chick was stepped on this morning by another hen while they were waiting for me to let them all out to roam. I'm sad and annoyed at myself because I knew I should have moved the hen and chicks, but my DH didn't want to brood them. He wanted the hen to do the work.....