Question

[daisychicken]

I want my hen to be broody and I am pretty sure she will. I am going to leave eggs there so she will hatch them but will her eggs survive until she thinks we have enough?

 

[Zaxby's2]

You usually don't want her to sit on eggs that are older than ten days. Although they still might hatch, the number that hatch will start to decline. What you need to do is collect the eggs you want her to hatch, put them in a carton in your house, then put 10 - 15 real or fake eggs in the nest. Hopefully she'll go broody and you can switch out the eggs.

 

[donrae]

That's about what I do, too. I have enough hens I use real eggs to entice them to go broody, and save the eggs I want them to hatch inside. When I determine she's serious about brooding (for me that's two nights in a row on the nest) I remove the marker eggs and put the desired eggs under her. I also mark them so I can check and see if any other hen has added eggs to the clutch and remove them. Partially brooded eggs are just nasty!