Suggestions for a broody type bantam

[ghulst]

Silkies are good broodies only if it doesn't get to cold.If it gets cold the eggs don't hatch near as good as eggs under a hard feathered chicken. 25 years ago I crossed a silkie with a leghorn and we got the best setters you could get. All hard feathered. A freind and I hatched goslings under them.

 

[Southerngirl]

I swear by Japanese bantams and Cochin bantmas. They will make a nest anywhere ! Once we had one hatch some in the barn in February when we had snow on the ground. She had hidden in the back of the barn and DH happened to see her with 4 babies walking in the snow !!! We put them in a safe place and they all lived.

Here is Henrietta the most broody hen alive ! She is 1/2 Jap and 1/2 Cochin.

Here is a Jap bantam who made a nest in a flower pot on the front porch.

 

[Pink Delphinium]

Yep...silkies are great...but my quail antwerp belgians are always happy to set. They're little sweeties, too. I think they're even more friendly than silkies. Just know that the roosters of the breed are almost always agressive...not that it's a huge problem with such a tiny little thing, but if you have kids, they might be afraid of them. Good luck!

 

[jossanne]

I'm hoping my bantam cochins hurry up and grow up and start going broody. I'm working on a homemade incubator, but I bought the cochins to set eggs, and will hopefully have them and the bator going at the same time! Go cochins go!

Besides that, they are the sweetest little tiny things. I LOVE them!

 

[msgenie516]

Hi,

My Silkies are so broody I call them the "Broody Bunch"! Right now, in the middle of winter, three out of seven are broody and are all huddled together in one nest along with a broody Silkie/Frizzle (Sizzle).

The only downside I can think of is that, because of their smaller size, they may not be able to set on as many eggs as a full size girl.

Good luck! Genie

 

[Pink Delphinium]

I used to have a white cochin banty that was the best setter and mother. Just let anyone or anything get close to her chicks and she was like a white tornado.

She had everyone in the hen house walkin' on eggshells! She wouldn't accept anyone else's chicks, though, like my buff orpingtons do,

. They just lift their wings and let the additional chicks join the bunch (I always let them hatch a couple of their own and then add whichever ones I've ordered from the hatchery a day or so later).