Chickenfortress, you were asking about what to do with any remaining eggs left in the nest after your broody hen takes her hatched chicks out to feed. I was describing what I've observed with the many Mama hens here. They tend to stay on the nest for 24+ hours until most of the eggs hatch, then take all those chicks out together for their first outing. Rarely, if ever, do they get those remaining eggs to hatch.
Some folks will take the chicks from the nest as soon as they hatch and keep them in a brooder. Some do this so the hen will stay on the nest until every egg hatches. Some will then return the brooded chicks to the hen, some continue to keep them in the brooder.
Other folks will let the chicks stay with the Mama, and whenever she decides to take her chicks out of the nest they'll take the remaining unhatched eggs and incubate them artificially until they hatch.
Often the remaining eggs are duds anyway, or contain chicks that stopped developing, or have other problems that kept them from hatching when the others did. Usually by the time I get to them they're already cold & any life within has ended. Sometimes I'm curious to see what has/has not developed inside, usually I don't. When I said "toss them" I didn't mean literally to throw them through the air -- never a good idea with potentially rotten eggs! I just meant you needn't take extreme measures to artificially incubate these eggs and try to get them to hatch if you didn't want to. I usually bury our cold unhatched eggs under bushes so they'll become a part of another living thing.
