Sick Chicken?

[walkeasy]

thanks for all the great feed back. This is great. We do not have a roo. We do however have a friend that needs her services. Can we put those eggs under her? Will she set on them until the hatch or does she only sit for 21 days? She has been doing this for a few days now. We could maybe get the eggs in two days. I would keep 1 or 2 and give the others back to our friend. I read we can do six. Also, how would we isolate her? Is that important if we mark the fert eggs? Our chickens our spoiled and have about an acre to roam on every day. Wouldn't want to isolate her, she is doing her part in keeping my bugs down. Do she poo in the nest? I would assume not..


This could be very fun.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Mark the eggs with a pencil very clearly. She may steal eggs from other nests. She may go to another nest by mistake and let her eggs get cold, too.

She won't poo in the nest...she will get up to poo once a day, and eat and drink. She will lose a lot of weight.

She will set until they hatch. I actually have had a broody die of brooding. She brooded for at least two to three months. I tried to break her of it at least twice by putting her in a hutch with wire bottom and food/water. She would roost with the other hens for 24 hours and back to brooding. In retrospect I wish I had let her raise some chicks.

She isn't broody if she is leaving the nest to eat bugs and wander all over. She should only leave the nest for maybe 15 minutes a day from my experience. I don't trust a hen with hatching eggs unless they have set for at least a week.

I now put my broody hens in a hutch to set on eggs and let them out once a day. They have food and water in there. You can use a dog crate. I sit out there for about 15 minutes and then gather her back up (she by then has gone and sat in a nest box in the coop) to put her back in the hutch. That way she won't let the eggs get cold by getting onto another nest by mistake.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Oh and you may want to join in on the Old Fashioned Broody hatch a long thread.