The natural way

[stuckinthecity]

Love this post!! I had a friend who sat almost 2 dozen eggs under one of his buff hens. I believe she was a buff rock mix, not an orp...but she was super fluffy like an orp is supposed to look. How many of your hens go broody? I've only had one game hen go broody...I've got 2 Sussex hens, a Wyandotte, a Dominique, and 2 game hens (And 14 RIR, but I don't count on any of them going broody)...I thought I would have better luck than just one out of the 6. I'd love to switch to a more broody breed, but I love my RIR's for eggs...

 

[crealbilly]

Love this post!! I had a friend who sat almost 2 dozen eggs under one of his buff hens. I believe she was a buff rock mix, not an orp...but she was super fluffy like an orp is supposed to look. How many of your hens go broody? I've only had one game hen go broody...I've got 2 Sussex hens, a Wyandotte, a Dominique, and 2 game hens (And 14 RIR, but I don't count on any of them going broody)...I thought I would have better luck than just one out of the 6. I'd love to switch to a more broody breed, but I love my RIR's for eggs...

I had a flock of RIRs 3 years and had 2 go broody all those years. The first one starved her self to death. Dispute having her own private food and water that was about 3' away. She would not get off the nest. She died before she hatched a single chick. The second one sat on 8 eggs but only hatched out 2 chicks (a hen and a roo). I gave the roo away but I kept momma RIR and her hen - I still have both them today.

I switched to Buff Orpington's because my grand daughter loves chickens and BOs are so calm and they like for her to pick them up. My RIRs were skittish and down right mean to each other. My BOs are calm and gentle - a completely different chicken than RIRs.

I moved the second brood of 11 BO chicks and their momma into the layer yard today. I threw out a couple of handfuls of cracked corn which is a treat to them. But look at the little BO chicks in the middle of the flock. This is a awesome example of how gentle BOs are... If I would have done this with my RIRs - I can guarantee those little chicks would be bloody, if not pecked to death.

I really don't see much of a decrease in egg production between BO & RIRs. My BOs went right through the winter with no decrease what so ever. I get atleast 12 eggs a day from my 16 mature BO hens. They are very consistent.

 

[walkswithdog]

I have a (work in progress) flock of 10 silkie/cochin/easter Eggers. So far four have gone broody in the last month. Four. One is certifiably insane and keeps trying to steal more eggs. I'm shoving every last, oops the hen did it wrong chick -That I had to hatch, under her tomorrow night. There are seven of those. Marbled brained, feather-Headed nutjobs. Admittedly all are first time, first year broodies, and the hoarder would starve herself to death to have a brood, hence tomorrow night'so chick stuffing. I have an incubator because dude, chickens have brains the size of a large pea. The whole line I'm working with brood. And it can get nuts. No, I don't have a nursery yard, they all end up together with the whole flock. I guess because they are all biddable broody birds, none of them picks on chicks. They're third and fourth generation now, I get a rainbow of egg colors. And they are bbs or bbs/partridge. They all laid over winter, at least the ones old enough to.
Working slowly toward giant sizzle type EE's. Yes, I'm nuts. I am walkswthdog and I am addicted to chickens and hatching.