By the way, I met a lady at the feedstore that tried to place chicks with her broody. The lady tried to give them to her during the day and the hen just freaked out and ran for the other side of the yard. We talked a bit and I shared my own experiences. First of all, it is best to separate/confine the broody hen in a pet carrier several days in advance, preferably at night. A broody needs some darkness and alone time to really get comfortable. Otherwise she is always in defense mode of the nest against "intruders" aka other hens, you or even chicks. Once the hen is sitting tight for a few days, you can add freshly hatched chicks at night and the hen will almost always accept them. I've heard the chicks need to be young (no more than a week old at the most) or they won't accept the mom or mothering because they are too independent. Don't know if that is true or not. The lady I spoke to said her hen eventually adopted the chicks after about a week or so. That was probably a very dangerous time for those little babies. I sure wouldn't want to gamble with chicks I'd paid money for like that. Anyways, just sharing information.
Currently, I have one broody happily adopting freshly hatched chicks (from Tumbleweed and the feedstore) one more broody broken of broodiness, one more broody to break, and two more broodies to find eggs to sit and hatch out. I can only hope that I'll not have any others go broody, but I bet I will have at least 3 others before summer really sets in. Too bad. The early hen gets the chicks!
ETA: Has anyone else had a hen adopt chicks? Or, what do you do to break your hens of broodiness?
. Trying so hard not to get more - that darn chicken math.
