- Dec 28, 2009
- 2,551
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Mrs. K :
I think you might have a bit of a wreck. And nothing might hatch. However it is not too late to fix it.
The thing is that with too many eggs, they do not all get consistent heat, as they get moved around. They get too cold and die. The other thing is the egg begins to develop when placed under the mother hen. Later placed eggs, develop much later, and at the end, the hen will leave the nest after about 24 hours of the first egg hatching. those later eggs will die.
I would start over, she sounds like a great hen that really wants to be a mom, and as stated, there is nothing as much fun as watching this process, and after you have a hen raise chicks, you will never go back!
I would collect some fertilized eggs, mark them with a pencil, so you know which eggs they are. If she is a standard hen, she should be able to cover well 10-12 eggs, and if you check the hatching forum, you can figure on about a 50% hatch. Then at night in the dark, I would slip her off the nest, remove all of those eggs, place your marked eggs under her, and return her to the nest, and mark the calendar for 21 days.
You can either, block off her nest so that other hens can't get into it, or move her to a separate place, but then you will have reintroduction issues. I left mine with the flock this summer, and it worked well. My nest is so small, two hens cannot fit into it. You need to check, and make sure only the marked eggs are under her (if she will let you, mine would remove your hand at the elbow if you tried to get into her nest)
I really think it would be better if you started over. The eggs need to start all together. Sometimes you will have a hen hide a nest, and everyday, she will slip off to lay in a hidden spot. Those eggs just sit there, and do not start to develop, then one day she will decide that there is enough eggs in the nest, and begin to set on the nest, only getting off once or so a day. Many chicken people have thought that they lost a hen, only to have her bring her chicks out 3 weeks later.
MrsK
I think you might have a bit of a wreck. And nothing might hatch. However it is not too late to fix it.
The thing is that with too many eggs, they do not all get consistent heat, as they get moved around. They get too cold and die. The other thing is the egg begins to develop when placed under the mother hen. Later placed eggs, develop much later, and at the end, the hen will leave the nest after about 24 hours of the first egg hatching. those later eggs will die.
I would start over, she sounds like a great hen that really wants to be a mom, and as stated, there is nothing as much fun as watching this process, and after you have a hen raise chicks, you will never go back!
I would collect some fertilized eggs, mark them with a pencil, so you know which eggs they are. If she is a standard hen, she should be able to cover well 10-12 eggs, and if you check the hatching forum, you can figure on about a 50% hatch. Then at night in the dark, I would slip her off the nest, remove all of those eggs, place your marked eggs under her, and return her to the nest, and mark the calendar for 21 days.
You can either, block off her nest so that other hens can't get into it, or move her to a separate place, but then you will have reintroduction issues. I left mine with the flock this summer, and it worked well. My nest is so small, two hens cannot fit into it. You need to check, and make sure only the marked eggs are under her (if she will let you, mine would remove your hand at the elbow if you tried to get into her nest)
I really think it would be better if you started over. The eggs need to start all together. Sometimes you will have a hen hide a nest, and everyday, she will slip off to lay in a hidden spot. Those eggs just sit there, and do not start to develop, then one day she will decide that there is enough eggs in the nest, and begin to set on the nest, only getting off once or so a day. Many chicken people have thought that they lost a hen, only to have her bring her chicks out 3 weeks later.
MrsK
