Should I candle if not sure how long broody has been on eggs?

[Nicky S]

We have our first broody hen, who we decided to let sit - an Austra white - and we've really made a mess of things to put it mildly! We moved her out off the nesting box after a few days because she was stealing everyone's eggs and constantly adding to her collection and eggs were not fitting under her (she's quite tiny), and the others refused to lay elsewhere, despite getting them a second identical coop. At first all was well. We moved her into the garage at night with an open pen and covered nesting box, and she stayed on her nest. However, the next day when she got up to poop and eat/drink, I think she got confused as I found her sitting on a shelf...I think she was trying to get back to her coop, and she was acting very broody when I approached. Anyhow, I thought maybe she wanted to stretch her legs outside, and she ran right out and into the old coop and sat on new eggs. I don't know how long she was off the first set, but we returned them to her outside just in case. This is where things get cloudy. We were supposed to have a system for marking the eggs so we would know which ones to remove, but then she started pushing out some of the first ones and we assumed they weren't viable, and I think she ended up with different eggs from different days. Then we got nervous about candling the eggs as one night as I was lifting her off the nest to candle she took an egg with her and it smashed (luckily it looked infertile). Thankfully she seemed to stop taking in more eggs at one point and seemed to be happy with 6, but after we candled another night she pushed out what looked like was a growing egg (fairly cold next morning) and two more that were still very warm, so I returned them while I tried to decide what to do and then they got mixed up. Now I'm not finding eggs from the others again so worry she may have taken more, but they might not be laying as much. But no more eggs have been pushed out. So now she has been sitting for 22 days, but we are not sure how old the eggs are she is sitting on (though we do know none are from the first batch). Can we candle now or if they are closer to hatching should we not touch them? Of course I'm nervous about something happening if there are dead eggs in there too, and for our hen's well-being (she's currently still in growly pancake stage and seems ok, though a little pale and dirty.). I've tried taking her treats to her nest but she's 100% hypnotized. It's also pretty cold at night so I worry about trying to candle the eggs then (plus we're not very good at telling what is what despite lots of photos for reference!). Should I just let her be for now? How much longer do I give her on the nest if so? Many thanks!

 

[fin-dachickmasta]

Candle and take photos plz.

 

[Lady of McCamley]

Oh my. This is a bit of a scramble isn't it. Sadly, as you've figured out, you've broken most of the brooding rules...always set eggs at the same time, mark with set date, remove any freshly laid eggs daily, lock down from day 18 forward, don't give the hen more eggs than she can comfortably sit, if moved make sure she can't confuse and go back to old nest.

Okay, so now what. Generally I'd candle and leave eggs that look most developed while removing those that aren't. Please skip photographing. You want to handle the eggs as little as possible. Go out at night with a good flashlight. Developed eggs will be a dark blob at one end with air cell on other. Just developing will have roadmap of veins. Duds will be clear. If you are insecure about candling, I'm inclined then to just let her sit until some chicks start to hatch as some must be almost developed to hatch. Likely she will get up with the chicks and decide for you who hatched, or if she ignores hatched chicks to set, you can take the chicks to artificially brood and let her continue hatching. However you do have a staggered mess. I typically at that point just dispose of unhatched 2 days after the first hatch. Since these were set on different days, you can decide if you want to incubate the developed ones yourself to let momma brood the hatched.

Anyway, that's the options I see at this point.

Good luck.
LofMc

 

[Nicky S]

Oh my. This is a bit of a scramble isn't it. Sadly, as you've figured out, you've broken most of the brooding rules...always set eggs at the same time, mark with set date, remove any freshly laid eggs daily, lock down from day 18 forward, don't give the hen more eggs than she can comfortably sit, if moved make sure she can't confuse and go back to old nest.

Okay, so now what. Generally I'd candle and leave eggs that look most developed while removing those that aren't. Please skip photographing. You want to handle the eggs as little as possible. Go out at night with a good flashlight. Developed eggs will be a dark blob at one end with air cell on other. Just developing will have roadmap of veins. Duds will be clear. If you are insecure about candling, I'm inclined then to just let her sit until some chicks start to hatch as some must be almost developed to hatch. Likely she will get up with the chicks and decide for you who hatched, or if she ignores hatched chicks to set, you can take the chicks to artificially brood and let her continue hatching. However you do have a staggered mess. I typically at that point just dispose of unhatched 2 days after the first hatch. Since these were set on different days, you can decide if you want to incubate the developed ones yourself to let momma brood the hatched.

Anyway, that's the options I see at this point.

Good luck.
LofMc

Thank you - yes that makes a lot of sense. We did candle and found a couple with veins, so we are going to leave her be and hopefully we’ll have some chicks for her soon. Our incubator has arrived, and we’ll set it up for any eggs that don’t hatch just in case. It does look like the majority haven’t developed, I’m not sure if they were even fertilized. At any rate, at least we don’t have many rules left to break I guess , hopefully we can get a couple of babies for her out of this.