When to trust young broody

[Jenngee]

Trying to keep this short.

So we have eggs in incubator, all doing well. Due to go on lock down tomorrow, to hatch tue/wed.

I have a young hen outside who started laying a few weeks ago. Who this morning has been sitting in the nest box, looks to be going broody. When moved returns to sit on eggs straight away.

So we are having a new central heating system fitted beginning Monday (bad planning on my part) and it occurred to me that at some point they might need to put the electricity off. (Ah I will be on lock down).

My options are

A) to move the incubator to my sisters, a 20 min drive away. Meaning they would hatch there, boo we would miss all the fun.

B) Make the workmen aware of the situation and ask for electric to be off for as short a spell as possible. And if more than once in a day that it’s left to recover temp and humidity for an hour or so before going off again.

C) Now this hen has gone broody I am wondering if I could swap the eggs she’s on for the ones due to hatch. If so when should I do it. How do I know she’s serious and isn’t going to get bored and leave the eggs at such a critical point? Would she be confused if the eggs hatched so quickly?

 

[HuffleClaw]

I’d do plan C- once you REALLY 100% know she’s broody. And if you see that she’s leaving the nextong box all the time, then you may want to jump back to plan A.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Trying to keep this short.

So we have eggs in incubator, all doing well. Due to go on lock down tomorrow, to hatch tue/wed.
[...]
My options are

A) [...]
B) [...]
C) [...]

What about plans
D: Go and by a portable generator and run the incubator on that?
E: Buy an inverter for your car and run the incubator on your car?

 

[ShrekDawg]

What about plans
D: Go and by a portable generator and run the incubator on that?
E: Buy an inverter for your car and run the incubator on your car?

x2. I would say that these are far better options than the ones suggested.

 

[HuffleClaw]

What about plans
D: Go and by a portable generator and run the incubator on that?
E: Buy an inverter for your car and run the incubator on your car?

 

[Jenngee]

Had no idea you could get such a thing, had considered a generator but had visions of a huge petrol thing, pulling the string to kick it in to life on the kitchen table. Will have a look now. Thanks

 

[Abriana]

I would go with C. When my most broody hen went broody, I could tell she was serious. I put three eggs under her (she's a bantam, three normal sized eggs!), and those were the first of seven batches of chicks. She is an excellent mama! Since she is a first time mother, have the incubator at hand.

 

[aart]

I would go with B first....ask them how long the power will need to be off.
Up to a couple hours should be fine..wrap the incubator in a blanket.

Too soon to count on the maybe broody IMO.
If she's new and you are new to broodies...takes more than one day to be sure a broody is truly broody.

Oh, and Welcome to BYC!!
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[Jenngee]

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions of plans d and e.

I have some more info on my profile now too, thanks.

I messaged our engineer today, and he replied saying the power would only be off for a short while at some point later in the week, thurs or fri. So hopefully by that point we should have chicks and a hot water bottle should suffice for the short person of time it’s off.

Happy days.

The broody chook outside has changed her mind today and is out hunting worms with the others.

I am confident we should be ok now. Thanks again everyone

 

[Jenngee]

Just to quickly update. We have hatched 6 chicks from 7 eggs.

Went with plan b and the guys doing the work have been great. The power hasn’t been off yet, chicks all arrived yesterday at 19days incubation ‍ Earlier than I thought they might but all seem perfectly well and they literally popped out one after another in an amazing show of the fastest unzipping I have ever seen! Very pleased. Thanks all