I did this with just one chick, but others have done this with more. I am no expert; I learned about this on BYC, of course!
Poppy, my BO, was seriously broody. She is still a pullet, so I'd read that some young broodies give up and come off the nest too soon. But Poppy stayed on the nest almost all day, every day for about a week before I decided I'd try getting her to adopt. She'd laid a few eggs and my others had laid their eggs in the same nest. She was sitting on a clutch of 6 eggs. I took them all and gave her 2 ceramic eggs I'd had from when I was first training them to use the nest boxes. So I moved her - nest box and all - to the isolation pen I built under the poop board in my coop. I use recycled file crates for nests, so this was easy. I left the other in place for my other girls.
Here she is in full velociraptor mode:
I called a bunch of feed stores in my area to find out when they received shipments of chicks and whether or not they had a minimum order (TSC has a minimum of 4, and I only wanted one). I have 3 chicks on order for June, and my current coop/run set up isn't big enough for a whole bunch of new birds. Plus, my hubby wasn't super keen on the idea. Anyway, I found a store that got shipments on Thursdays and had no minimum. Poppy would be setting for 3 weeks on the Monday after Easter - the first day of my spring break (I'm a teacher). The timing could NOT have been better! There is always a risk that the broody won't accept the chicks, so I wanted to make sure I was home to observe so I could intervene if she rejected the chick.
On Thursday, I set up my brooder indoors in case I ended up raising the chick myself. I figured that if Poppy rejected it, I would go back to the feed store and get another chick so I wouldn't have a lone chick. If the adoption was successful, 1 chick would be fine because she would have her mama.
I went to the feed store right after work that Friday. From what I'd read, the younger the chick, the more likely the broody will adopt because she will be more likely to think her eggs had hatched. The chick would be 3 days old at the most if it had been received at the store on Thursday. I wanted an autosexing or sex linked breed because I wanted a pullet. They had red sex links and Welsummers at the feed store. I chose a Welsummer.
The new chick the day I brought her home:
I brought her home and put her in the brooder. I waited until it was VERY dark - after 10, I think - grabbed the chick, headed out to the coop, and sneaked in without any light. It was so dark. I had to wait a few minutes until my eyes adjusted. I could JUST see via the porch light. I grabbed the eggs from under Poppy and stuck the chick under her wing.
Now, everything I'd read suggested that if the broody accepted the chick, she would start clucking at it (that same clucking you described). But Poppy was silent. I sat in the coop for a while, just listening. Nothing. I started to wonder if the chick had somehow suffocated or something! I am so paranoid....
I decided I would set my alarm for super early in the morning so that I could get in there before dawn in case Poppy freaked out. I got up after a few restless hours of nightmares about chicken cannibalism and went into the coop. Opening the door woke everyone up. My other pullets hopped down and started their day. Poppy was awake, but STILL silent. The chick was also silent. I tried reaching into the nest, and Poppy got upset. Then it was like she suddenly realized something had changed. She stood up a couple of times and looked underneath her. Then she started clucking. The baby started peeping, and only then did I know it had been successful. They have been inseparable since!
Poppy is a very good mama. She has been raising her in my yard ever since. It's been 2 weeks now, and everything has been going smoothly. The other pullets don't really pay any attention to the baby. My top pullet, Zinnia (BPR), once got a little too close. Poppy jumped on Zinnia, flattened her, and started pecking her face! It was crazy! No one has bothered mama or baby since. Poppy and the baby still sleep on the nest on the floor.
Here they are on their first day Poppy brought her out of the nest:
The only drawback is that Poppy isn't super thrilled about me being around Bryony (the baby). I am not sure how friendly she will be. Poppy is very, very friendly when she's not raising a baby. I'm hoping she will learn to like me more after seeing Poppy interact with me.
Edited to add that hubby LOVES the baby! Poppy is his favorite pullet, and he just can't get enough of watching them and recording them running around the yard! Haha! I knew he'd feel that way...
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