Opposed to broody hens?

[fla_native]

Ive noticed alot of opposition to broody hens of late....Why?
I recall not too many years ago that a broody hen was considered a prize possession!
Once I got into alot of trouble because a lady who had a really good broody decided to sell her, my mom told me to run to her house and get it. I decided to stop to do a little fishing and by the time I got there it was gone......LOTS of trouble over that one!
I let my broodys do all the hatching for me....better hatch rate,healthier chicks.

 

[Year of the Rooster]

Because now, broodies are very common and when they do brood, they don't lay, which is why people wanted them. Not say they're a bad thing as I love mine, but they are a pain in the butt to break.

 

[PunkinPeep]

Quote:
I'm interested in this. What kind of chickens do you have? I want to let my chickens hatch and raise their chicks. I have buff orpingtons.

 

[jqs birds]

I Love broodies esecially for thee ability to raise thee little ones.
This spring I had one hatch 6 baby Turkeys. I thought this was too many for her to raise so I brought 2 in and raised them in a brooder. I assumed they would do better than the ones she raised. Wrong! THe ones she raised in the coop with all the other birds are quite a bit bigger! You wouldn't know they were hatched the same day or from the same brood. The chicks I raised are about 2 weeks behind there brothers and sisters.

 

[PunkinPeep]

Quote:
that is so cool!

 

[fla_native]

I'm interested in this. What kind of chickens do you have? I want to let my chickens hatch and raise their chicks. I have buff orpingtons.

We(the wife and I) have at present a dozen Blue Cochins and a dozen Black Jersey Giants....Needless to say, the Cochins
do all our hatching for both groups.

I personally have 30 "mutt" chickens. They are a project of mine, my wife doesnt care for them, they arent "cuddly"!
Of those 30 five are roosters and of the hens 3 go broody regularly. One particular hen looks to be a brown leghorn- buzzard cross....she will hatch a basketball and eat your arms off if you mess with her babies!

 

[Ridgerunner]

We all have our reasons for having chickens. Many of us have restrictions on how many we can have or maybe only hens, no roosters.

A lot of the opposition to broody hens is from people that cannot hatch out any chicks or already have hatched out all the chicks they need. If you don't want a hen to hatch out chicks, you are feeding her and she is not laying.

Some people, for their own reasons, prefer to hatch using an incubator and raise them in a brooder.

Many of us consider a broody hen very good. It depends on your individual circumstances.

I firmly believe that if you have a broody hen and do not want to hatch eggs, you need to bust her from being broody. Do one or the other. It is hard on a hen to be broody. Why put her through that if you don't have to?

 

[Chickenmaven]

"Opposed" - I dunno? I suppose I would say it is inconvenient to have a hen (or two or three) hogging nest space & not laying & barely eating. I let a couple hatch out chicks several weeks ago, now I am done...but the hens think otherwise. One of our current broodies will mess the nest if we don't make her take breaks. Ick!