Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread

[AinaWGSD]

I'm new to EE's and I am smitten, the one in the pic I was asking about even lets me cuddle her.. when i can catch her

I really like my EE's a lot. They've all been very friendly. Tiger, the EE in my avatar, will probably have a home here even if she stops laying because she's our favorite and lets my two year old carry her around the yard (if he can catch her...which she doesn't try too hard to prevent since he frequently does). But I've had a lot of issues with EE too, which makes me a little shy at the same time. When we got our first chickens, we ordered 4 EE, and the hatchery sent an extra one. We kept 3 of them and gave 2 away. I don't know what happened with the 2 we gave away, but of the 3 we kept, we only have one left and she's not quite 2! One had a crossbeak which got to the point that she was loosing weight and we culled her so that we didn't have to watch her starve to death this winter. The other one was my favorite, of course. She was an internal layer, never did lay a normal egg, and when we processed her we found that her abdominal cavity was full of nasty egg yolk. I hated culling her, she let my toddler pick her up without even trying to run away, but when we cleaned her out it confirmed that it was the right thing, it was only a matter of time before she died a slow painful death from egg yolk peritonitis. I'd like to think it was just my bad luck, since tons of people have EE and never have a problem. But even with the eggs we hatched here, in the first hatch we had a chick that developed a crossbeak at about 3 days old. That one's beak got bad so much more quickly than our first crossbeak's that we decided to cull at 10 days because it seemed obvious that she would need to be tube fed to survive as she got bigger and that's just no quality of life for a chicken IMO.

 

[WVChickenFarmer]

I heard a yogurt maker works pretty well. good luck.

I will keep that in mind for next time. She was sitting on like 18+ eggs so that might be little to small. Right now we have a incubator made from a styrofoam cooler. I guess we will find out in about 5 days if we was able to save any chicks. I will update you all and let you know what happens with the eggs.

 

[AinaWGSD]

Good luck! And remember, if the eggs got cold it may take an extra day or two for them to hatch. So don't loose all hope if nothing happens on day 21.

 

[WVChickenFarmer]

Good luck! And remember, if the eggs got cold it may take an extra day or two for them to hatch. So don't loose all hope if nothing happens on day 21.

Thank you! The eggs did get cold so yeah we will give them a few extra days to hatch. I'm not going to lose hope on them! I really hope we were able to save some of the babies!

 

[Chicken Chat]

I have had a successful hatch(incubator) then successfully placed them under a broody. Hen and chicks are doing very well. At what point can one put hen and chicks with the rest of the flock? These chicks seem a bit undersized, but they are, by far, the most vigorous chicks I have seen. Any and all comments(advice) welcome! Thanks

I like to keep my moms and chicks separate for a bit to make sure that babies are learning to eat and drink without the rest of my flock trying to horn in. I keep them in a fenced off section of my coop. Once I see that moms and babies are comfortable going back and forth and moms are freely walking around, I know it's time to take the fence down. I like to make sure I'm home so I can watch and verify mom is protecting the chicks. I have a mom with a 2 month old that was terrible at first. She would abandon her baby and not protect it. I had to move them to a fenced off area with a modified dog house were she couldn't loose her chick and the rest couldn't hurt it. They spent 3 weeks in there before I trusted her with the rest of the flock, she is ok as a mom but I don't think I would let her raise another. My other broody moms have all been terrific, great protectors. You never know.

 

[artsyrobin]

checking in with you all...lea is sitting on 3, 2 ee's and a brown, i can see veins- so i am back to getting her into a broody area- nilly is on 3, josie is starting over as none showed development, and licorice is a holy terror if you even look at her babies- just to get a good look i had to crate her- gives a new understanding to a protective hen!

 

[Zootopia]

I have had a successful hatch(incubator) then successfully placed them under a broody. Hen and chicks are doing very well. At what point can one put hen and chicks with the rest of the flock? These chicks seem a bit undersized, but they are, by far, the most vigorous chicks I have seen. Any and all comments(advice) welcome! Thanks

I like to keep them separated for 3-4 days but let them out while I am doing chores so I can watch. Sometimes you have other hens who are aggressive, I will pull them out to let mom and babies have time to get settled with the rest of the flock. My roos have been good, but if the roo is a problem I'd keep the broody and babies put up for awhile longer.

 

[bobbieschicks]

So cute!

checking in with you all...lea is sitting on 3, 2 ee's and a brown, i can see veins- so i am back to getting her into a broody area- nilly is on 3, josie is starting over as none showed development, and licorice is a holy terror if you even look at her babies- just to get a good look i had to crate her- gives a new understanding to a protective hen!

 

[vmdanielsen]

I like to keep my moms and chicks separate for a bit to make sure that babies are learning to eat and drink without the rest of my flock trying to horn in. I keep them in a fenced off section of my coop. Once I see that moms and babies are comfortable going back and forth and moms are freely walking around, I know it's time to take the fence down. I like to make sure I'm home so I can watch and verify mom is protecting the chicks. I have a mom with a 2 month old that was terrible at first. She would abandon her baby and not protect it. I had to move them to a fenced off area with a modified dog house were she couldn't loose her chick and the rest couldn't hurt it. They spent 3 weeks in there before I trusted her with the rest of the flock, she is ok as a mom but I don't think I would let her raise another. My other broody moms have all been terrific, great protectors. You never know.

I like to keep them separated for 3-4 days but let them out while I am doing chores so I can watch. Sometimes you have other hens who are aggressive, I will pull them out to let mom and babies have time to get settled with the rest of the flock. My roos have been good, but if the roo is a problem I'd keep the broody and babies put up for awhile longer.

I don't feel optimistic about putting the chicks and mom in with the rest of flock as I have a leghorn in there and she is VERY territorial. Mom is doing a great job with her babies. Makes me never want to brood chicks again! I have 12 more eggs in the incubator and I keep hoping someone else goes broody! If I put mom and chicks in with the rest of the flock, should I do it at night? Thanks for your input Zoo and Chicken!

 

[bobbieschicks]

Haha - I watched my silkie roo chase one of the Lavender Orps around the run this morning - his little body went as fast as his legs could go - he managed to grab some of her neck feathers, but never caught her. He gave up on that one and went for another. But he didn't catch any of them - this time. I'm sure he'll get better at it as he gets bigger.

Quote:

It's not too surprising to me. I never saw my rooster mount any of my hens, not even once. I did see him dance for Gloria, but she just gave him an "I'm not impressed" look and kind of chest bumped him! Not surprisingly, none of her eggs that we set were fertile. Neither were any of my SLW eggs, every time he came near her she ran away. And only half of the sussex eggs we set were fertile, so I think one of the two speckled sussex girls gave him the cold shoulder. But out of 32 eggs that we started with, 19 started to develop. And every single one of the eggs from my Ameraucana and EE hens were fertile!