They've all gone mad! Whole flock broody!

[ManOverBoard]

Definitely worried as we had a girl drop dead today for no apparent reason! They're not eating their food hardly like they used to : (

Narrowed it down... Heat stroke. Explains our pale combs too.

 

[ManOverBoard]

Okay, big mamma alpha hen is in broody jail for being too aggressive... I'm feeling pretty awful about it though. She's always had one other hen as her partner in crime and they've never been separate, and it seems to be hard on the one not in broody jail.

 

[bcooper4]

I would love a pic of the mountain of chicks.

 

[kmk]

Okay, so we've been having some interesting and odd behavior from the girls. We've never had a broody before so we weren't sure, but we're now definitely sure it's being broody. We were excited about having one broody, but now all of our 10 hens are acting broody! It's like a bunch of clowns trying to fit into a clown car...a whole bunch of them will pile into the same nest, they start making all these crazy noises too! We've got 5 nest boxes, but they all want one specific one! I ended up having to move it to a more central location in the coop just to make sure there was enough air flow to keep everyone cool enough. We've even got a fan on them now. They all pile in there so high that it's a three layer lasagna of hens, and they all start heavily panting. I lift everyone out and try to get them focused on something else, but they all end up back in the nest. Eventually someone gets too uncomfortable and jumps out only for another one who hasn't gotten in yet to join the party. It's just madness! Some of the girls are starting to exhibit very pale combs and I'm getting worried that there stressing each other out. They're already in recovery mode from our rooster we just rehomed, but this is just too much. We moved the girls to a newer bigger coop and sent Slick the rooster packing to give the girls some reprieve, but they're definitely not getting it with all this broodiness.

How can we help these girls. 10 broody hens in one coop all at once is just nuts!
Again, we've got no experience with broodiness but it seems to be spreading like a bad case of the chicken pox in our coop!
Everyone's about a year old.
And this behavior has just exploded in the last week.
Advice? Please!

I'm still a newbie, but are you sure that it's broodiness? What about a reaction to removing the rooster? Could they all be confidently vying for the top spot in the pecking order?

 

[ManOverBoard]

I would love a pic of the mountain of chicks.

I will work on it! Our Australorp buff Orpington crossed rooster Chicks are getting big

 

[ManOverBoard]

I

I'm still a newbie, but are you sure that it's broodiness? What about a reaction to removing the rooster? Could they all be confidently vying for the top spot in the pecking order?

I wasn't sure at first, but it's definitely broodiness. We've had girls sitting all day and making all the broody sounds. Tucking the eggs under their flattened fluffed bodies.

 

[ManOverBoard]

I will work on it! Our Australorp buff Orpington crossed rooster Chicks are getting big

Ok! I'll try to get some daytime shots as it's hard to see everyone in the pile. But the chicks only pile at night and nap time. I've also included a pic of the big girls roosting, only I'm thinking now you probably were looking for a pic of the big girls posing as lasagna in a nest box. Although the girls do love spaghetti , the pig pile of hens has slowed down to a dull occasional duo as we've removed their favorite faught over nest and expanded their outside domain. They've also got a swanky new fan to keep it cool in the coop, and a beach umbrella for their run! Yay island hens!

 

[morsekathan]

My hens never leave the nest box when they go broody and they don't have eggs to sit on either! Because, as we all know, there is only one "good" nest box, the other hens squish in to lay, but I take the eggs away. So, I can verify that no eggs are needed for a hen to sit and sit and sit. We did put chicks under one hen once (at night) and she was so excited to wake up to babies! Virgin birth - no rooster or even eggs involved! We moved her to a brooder (converted dog house) at bedtime and then tucked the day old chicks under her around midnight. So cute! And she was such a great mom. Unfortunaley, we couldn't allow her to raise chicks again as we are severly limited by our municipality to the number of chickens we can have.

 

[ManOverBoard]

So sweet! None of our girls seem broody enough to sleep in the nest box, but when the sun comes up there's one hen in particular who's right back at it. We had eggs in the incubator we were going to slip the chicks to her in a separate coop,but none of the eggs took. We may wait and cross one of our new rooster boys to one of our Americaunas when they're all old enough but that's some time from now. The only other stud near by is a mille fleur bantam, and while our broody-ish Australorp is only about two and a half pounds she may still be too big for me fancy pants down the road. I wish our municipality allowed more chickens too. It's amazing how fast our family burns through eggs. Thank you for sharing your story, really loved reading it.

My hens never leave the nest box when they go broody and they don't have eggs to sit on either! Because, as we all know, there is only one "good" nest box, the other hens squish in to lay, but I take the eggs away. So, I can verify that no eggs are needed for a hen to sit and sit and sit. We did put chicks under one hen once (at night) and she was so excited to wake up to babies! Virgin birth - no rooster or even eggs involved! We moved her to a brooder (converted dog house) at bedtime and then tucked the day old chicks under her around midnight. So cute! And she was such a great mom. Unfortunaley, we couldn't allow her to raise chicks again as we are severly limited by our municipality to the number of chickens we can have