Giving our Broody hens eggs to sit on?

[kimmom]

We are thinking if giving the poor girl some fertilized eggs to hatch but I have a few questions. How many go under her, she is not a medium sized chicken that is quite wide. Also I saw a plan for a A frame like structure that Has slats across the front I thought we could put that in the coop
with all the others? In a dark corner maybe? Also do
we just feed her in there or let her out for a bit everyday? Any other advice? Thanks

[MamaMonica]

You might need to make her a barricade depending on your other hens. One of our hens last year destroyed the broodies' nests- she ate the eggs and killed two hatchlings. So we made a barricade out of a piece of green mesh fencing and put food and water in the corner. (We had six broodies communally brooding and stealing each others eggs, sometimes one bantam had six under her, maybe they can handle more. The big hen had ten eggs).

Have fun! It really is fun when they hatch.

[kimmom]

We made a little A frame that is about 30 inches wide at the bottom and 25 inches tall, it has 3 solid sides and on the front there are slats that are 2" apart but the bottom one is 3" off the ground.. We were going to make her a nest in there and put it in the corner of the coop. Would that work? We were also thinking of adding a chicken wire "run" around it so the chicks can go out from under Mom and explore a bit. What age can they all be back with the rest of the chickens? Ours are all hens and are between 17 weeks and 6 months except the older broody girl we are using to hatch them she is 2.5 approx. ALso will the broody hen just poop in the corner of the A frame we made or do we need to let her out of there. Right now the poor girl sits in the nesting box which seems to be the fav one for ALL the chickens so they squeeze in there with her and then lay and she puts the eggs under her! And we will just give her her own food and water once we move her into the new A frame.

[MamaMonica]

I have only hatched eggs once (we usually buy chicks), so some more experienced hatching mamas should check in. Your broody should be fine in a corner if she has food, water and fresh air circulating.

[Chicky2]

I give my hens as many eggs as they will take. If you see that they are poking out from under her, she has too many.

I also seclude my mamas in another coop, or a cage that is big enough for them to get off the nest and poop/eat/stretch.

Chickens are unlike our guineas in that they won't usually share a nest nicely.

If I have too many broody hens at once I'll break up the others until the ones that are currently setting are done.

ETA: remember that no matter how tempted you are, do not EVER help a chicken to hatch. They will surely die if you do. They either make it out on their own, or it just isn't meant to be.

[Momma2DoubleCuties]

The two mommas we had that have gone broody we've moved them at night to a new area alone. We've had a rooster with them so she just laid as many eggs as she saw fit and we left her alone. Out of the 4 I believe she'd laid, one a rat took from her (*shudder*) and then one broke with nothing and the other nothing ever came of, so she just ended up with one baby. She was a great momma! It was so cute to watch them together!

[Erinz]

I move my broody gals to their own little house and give them their own little run. They like to get up and go outside once a day or so for a few minutes to poo (it's amazing how much they can save up to get rid of all at once! wow!) and eat/drink/get some air. Once the babies are a couple days old they start weaving in and out of the run into the main pen (they share a fence on purpose so the other chickens can see the chicks and get used to them and vice versa) and within a few weeks they have integrated themselves with the flock (as in nobody bugging them and all scratching side by side) so I open up the pen so the mama hen can be with them if she wants or go back to her box.

I've tried not moving broodys before but invariably another hen jumps on her clutch while she's out for a moment and the whole thing gets messed up. I HATE wasting eggs! So I always move them (at night) now.

Fun! I can't wait to have a couple broodys again! My Buff Orpintons are notorious good mamas. Whenever I see them in the nesting box I get excited for a second but their usually just layin' an egg and get up and go!