recently broody hen

[anniemyth]

Ok, I wasn't expecting any of my girls to go broody yet b/c they are Jersey Giants and not yet 1 year old. But my splash girl started sitting tight 7 days ago on 2 eggs and a golf ball. I was planning on getting some babies this spring and thought, what the heck, I will just take the eggs from her and give her the babies. I candled yesterday and one of her eggs has a little embryo floating around. OMG I am so excited. I am going to give her the new chicks that I buy and then finish incubating the one egg. I can't wait to see what it looks like, a splash mom and a splash dad! I have to build miss prissy's incubator this week...

 

[silkiechicken]

YAY! Congrats on the fertile egg. I would wait at least 10 days before giving her chicks or she may reject them if her internal timer is not on schedule. I usually wait till 3 weeks so new chicks under neath feels "normal" to her.

 

[anniemyth]

today is day 8. Problem is, the new chicks that I am going to buy are arriving at the feed store Monday, which is day 11. Do you think I should go ahead and attempt to let her raise the bought ones try to incubate the eggs or let her hatch the eggs herself and keep the bought chicks inside in a brooder? Which way is there more chance of success?

 

[silkiechicken]

If this is the girls first time, I would think it would be best that you raise your store bought chicks and let her deal with the egg. Especially since you say you don't have an incubator. If you give her chicks and try to incubate the egg, two things can happen, she can reject the chicks and incubator could go hay wire.

If you keep the chicks, and give her the eggs, you know how to do the chicks, and at worse she will give up on the egg or reject her own lone chick. Plus, since she has only one egg? You raising a lone chick will be a bit time consuming. Trust me... I've tried the lone hatch thing. Constant day long peeping not so good...

 

[anniemyth]

Ok, good advice. I am going to build the incubator and test it out at a slower pace then.

I love the little fuzzies inside anyway. At least for a while.

 

[anniemyth]

Turns out I didn't know what I was looking at in the eggs so all that was developing was a warm yolk. Now I need to try to get her to snap out of her broody spell. Poor thing.

 

[silkiechicken]

You could try to give her one of the chicks you are getting... that will snap her out in about 24hours.

Don't worry about candling wrong... it takes practice... now get a bator and start practicing!

 

[anniemyth]

Does it matter how old the chicks are? I got them on Monday when they arrived from the feed store from the hatchery and I want to wait until the weekend to give any of them to her in case she rejects them I want to be around. Will a week matter?

 

[silkiechicken]

Just make sure food and water are close. A week old will probably work. Momma hen is wired to sit on the nest for a day or two after they first hatch, and if food is close, chick can go out and eat and momma will probably yield to getting up with the chick. Sooner is better though. You can give her as few as one just in case.

 

[RioLindoAz]

Quote:
Make sure that she has at least been setting for 1 week because she is not yet ready until she understands that she REALY is gunna have chicks