Please help!! Broody problems!

[ChickenCharmer]

I have about fifty chickens, and i don't have room for more. And now that it's spring, my girls are going broody at such a tremendous rate that it's not even funny. I did hatch a few chickies for them, but at this rate, I'll have more chickens than anyone would care to know.

Please help me!! i need to stop them! Who knows of the fastest and most efficient way to break a broody??????? I won't do the ice thing because that's too cruel, and the cage thing takes, like, a week or two, which doesn't really work for me. ANY IDEAS?????

 

[The Wolf Queen]

Take out their nest that they like so they wont set.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

I find that caging them is the most effective method for my birds. And it doesn't take 1-2 weeks, usually 3-4 days. Make sure the cage is set up high, on blocks or sawhorses, or hung from the rafters, so the girls get a nice breeze up underneath them. Provide food & water but NO bedding. Make sure it's in a bright, well-lit location. Some hens are more easily "broken" than others, and some will go back to being broody more quickly.

But you don't have to let them set eggs just because they're in a broody mood. However, if it's becoming too much trouble to repeatedly try to break them, or to accomodate them with eggs & chicks, you may want to sell/trade them to someone who does want good broody hens.

 

[ChickenCharmer]

Uh huh... Banty girl, I pretty much already tried that.. they usually just sit on the nests anyway, eggs or no eggs, it makes no difference. If I take the whole dern nest away, they just sit on the nest next to it...

And I'm not going to take all the nests away 'cuz then the other girls will lay in the forest, and I'm not even going to deal with that..

The cage thing is probably the best, and with some hens it just takes a few days, as Sunny Side Up said. But with many of them, they're not broken until at least a week... *rant*... and I was hoping anyone knew of any better ways. I also tried to shield their view of the barn, in which is their nest, but I'm not sure...

Any other tricks?