Too many eggs?

[Krichie82]

Hello all. I have a question. How many eggs can one chicken successfully hatch on her own? I have a nest box on my back porch that the neighborhood chickens have been laying in for about a week or so. As of this morning, there are 18 eggs in there. I'm pretty sure there are two hens laying in the box but possibly up to three. Only one of them is sitting on the nest and I'm beginning to worry that it's just too many eggs for her to successfully hatch. When she sits, she's only able to cover some of them and the others are being pushed to the edge of the box. I'm wondering if I should make another box and put some of the eggs in there in the hopes that one of the other hens will sit on them. What do you think?

 

[ChickenCanoe]

If she can't cover all the eggs, it will ruin most of the eggs since as she shuffles them they'll all spend enough time uncovered to kill them.
You can't make a hen go broody.
My advice is to remove any she can't cover and mark all the eggs that are under her so you can remove volunteers. Otherwise if other hens add eggs and they're not removed it will cause a staggered hatch, killing the embryos when she leaves the nest to care for the chicks and waste the eggs as well.

 

[Krichie82]

Okay, that's sounds like an good idea. The reason I was thinking of putting some in another box is because there is a broody hen on the property as well and she keeps coming to the porch checking out the nest but the other one runs her off. So, I thought that since she loves to sit maybe I could let her help out.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

If she will really sit it would work but If she comes and goes she'll ruin the eggs.

 

[Krichie82]

Awesome. Thank you. Yes.. she will def sit. We had to remove her from an nest of eggs that she had collected which weren't fertilized and were beginning to go bad. Poor thing.

Just so I understand... the eggs won't hatch unless the hen stays on the nest constantly? The broody does this, only leaving the nest once or twice a day to eat and eliminate but the other hen leaves several times a day and doesn't seem to sit on them at night. I read somewhere that the hens won't brood(?) until she is done laying her clutch. Is this true?

Thank you so much for the advice. I'll get to work on the new box.