Questions about a broody hen

[Tricorn]

One of our production red hens is broody. She's about 6 1/2 months old, been laying for a month and a bit. She started sitting in the nestboxes last week, but always was off during the day. Three days ago I got her some fertile eggs to sit on. She's been doing pretty well, but only for about 75% of the day. She gets off for a few hours in the morning and is definitly is off the eggs long enough for them to be cool to the touch. Today when I brought up feed she ate a bit and then went to sit on a different nest! I needed to collect those eggs so I moved her back to 'her' box, she was grumpy for a bit but eventually decided to sit on them.

So my question:

Will the cooling down hurt the eggs? What are the chances of a sucessful hatch if I keep doing this?

Should I separate her? Which is better- large dog kennal in the coop with the flock, or a section of stall away from the rest of the flock?


Suggestions?

 

[curious1969]

You might try moving her to a private area, such as a small dog kennel. I just went through a similar situation with a bantam hen I have. She would leave the nest to eat and then get in another one if there was an egg in it. Finally, after hatching 3 (very cold eggs she had abandoned) in the bator I decided to just sneak her babies under her and put an end to the whole fiasco! I did not try to move her because she is a really wild one

She is doing very well with raising her babies