ELeVan ~ Honaker Farm Journal

[Ms. Research]

Broody means hen wants to nest but can't lay eggs?

No. A "broody" hen is very capable of laying eggs and usually will. Once she feels that she has laid enough eggs in the nest for her to sit or incubate, she stops and starts an intensive sitting plan. In other words she only gets off the nest to eat, drink and defecate once or twice a day. When she's not doing that, she's sitting tight on her eggs.

I keep Silkie hens because they are notorious for being one of the best brooding hens available, and they are. Where it gets a little more complicated is when you use these hens to brood foster eggs for you.
If you want to use a bird to incubate eggs and not an artificial brooder, this is where they come in very handy. I use my Silkies to hatch guinea, peafowl and Buckeye chicken eggs who's natural moms might not make the best choice for brooding their own eggs. Just because a bird lays an egg doesn't mean it wants to sit and raise it until hatch.

As the Silkie is laying her natural eggs, I take that egg and replace it with my egg of choice or I allow her to lay her clutch and then replace the entire clutch at one time with the foster eggs. This allows the eggs to hatch at the same time within a day or two. Depending upon the species of egg that the Silkie is sitting, I may let her naturally raise the chicks or sometimes take them and put them in an artificial brooder until they are feathered and more mature. It just depends.

Of course if I am looking for Silkie chicks, they keep their own eggs and Silkie chicks are born.

Hope that helps you understand a broody hen.

Completely. Thanks for taking the time. My interest is that chickens are another part of the plan for our future farms. Eggs and to the freezer. I'll also look further into Silkie hens as well. Thanks again.

 

[elevan]

Stupid question here. What does it mean when your hen is broody? Have read that term a lot on BYC and am curious. Broody means hen wants to nest but can't lay eggs?

Sorry to hear about your goat teaching your cow bad habits. Looking forward to your new arrival on Sept. 2nd. Oh well, neighbors might think your strange but I would be the same way.. excited and checking my goat's rear too.

Good for "JukeBox Charlie" for helping Skeeter. I've read many stories about how a "good" roo can be an asset to a flock. No buyers for Skeeter yet?

No buyers for Skeeter...I'm beginning to think I'm meant to keep her. It's torture on me knowing that I'm the one who injured her and having to see her struggle everyday. I'm just going to have to buck up and get over it.

When a hen goes broody she stops laying eggs (often after she has a nest of them) and sets on a nest...even if it has no eggs. Her system slows down so she needs less water and food to live. Her body is geared toward keeping eggs warm and humid during this time. She flattens herself out to make sure she can cover all of her eggs (even when none are there). Some broody hens get defensive of their nest I am told. They remain on the nest until most or all of the eggs hatch or if none hatch they'll set a few days past when they were supposed to and then abandon the nest. Then when the chicks hatch they take care of them or brood them. Chicks are kept warm by tucking under their mama...she teaches them how and what to eat and where to find water. She doesn't start laying eggs again until her chicks no longer need her.

Miss Flufferbottom is my second broody hen this year. My first was a buckeye hen who was only 9 months old at the time and made a wonderful mama...although her chicks were not "allowed" to eat feed I put out for them - she insisted that they free range and they are now very good at it. Miss Fluffy is what my DH calls our chicken "dog"...she loves to be cuddled and will follow us around. She's not much for free range but I think she'll make an excellent mother now that she's trained herself to the nest in the coop. I just have to get her some fertile eggs (my roos are too young yet) from somewhere.

 

[Ms. Research]

Stupid question here. What does it mean when your hen is broody? Have read that term a lot on BYC and am curious. Broody means hen wants to nest but can't lay eggs?

Sorry to hear about your goat teaching your cow bad habits. Looking forward to your new arrival on Sept. 2nd. Oh well, neighbors might think your strange but I would be the same way.. excited and checking my goat's rear too.

Good for "JukeBox Charlie" for helping Skeeter. I've read many stories about how a "good" roo can be an asset to a flock. No buyers for Skeeter yet?

No buyers for Skeeter...I'm beginning to think I'm meant to keep her. It's torture on me knowing that I'm the one who injured her and having to see her struggle everyday. I'm just going to have to buck up and get over it.

When a hen goes broody she stops laying eggs and sets on a nest...even if it has no eggs. Her system slows down so she needs less water and food to live. Her body is geared toward keeping eggs warm and humid during this time. She flattens herself out to make sure she can cover all of her eggs (even when none are there). Some broody hens get defensive of their nest I am told. They remain on the nest until most or all of the eggs hatch or if none hatch they'll set a few days past when they were supposed to and then abandon the nest. Then when the chicks hatch they take care of them or brood them. Chicks are kept warm by tucking under their mama...she teaches them how and what to eat and where to find water. She doesn't start laying eggs again until her chicks no longer need her.

Miss Flufferbottom is my second broody hen this year. My first was a buckeye hen who was only 9 months old at the time and made a wonderful mama...although her chicks were not "allowed" to eat feed I put out for them - she insisted that they free range and they are now very good at it. Miss Fluffy is what my DH calls our chicken "dog"...she loves to be cuddled and will follow us around. She's not much for free range but I think she'll make an excellent mother now that she's trained herself to the nest in the coop. I just have to get her some fertile eggs (my roos are too young yet) from somewhere.

Thanks, understand even more about broody hens. Plus about free range and how some Hens feel their way is the best. Will look into buckeye as well. The more I know about the different breeds of chickens, the better to make decisions.

Don't fret too much about Skeeter. Skeeter sounds like she's dealing with what happened and has no bad thoughts against you. IMHO Life sometimes makes you deal with things you don't want to and you can either learn from it or fret and be miserable. Thanks for helping me with my learning process. Putting that anger to something good.

 

[elevan]

I FAMACHA scored all of my goats this afternoon and treated those who needed it with dewormer and red cell. I ended up looking like someone had bled out on the legs of my jeans when I drenched Daisy due to the red cell that was being spit back at me. Daisy does NOT like getting any kind of medication and it becomes a huge fight to get the job done.

Shortly after finishing up Jerry, our llama started sounding off an alarm call while looking at the back fence. All of the goats ran for the barn except Elsie who didn't understand what was going on...it was her first experience with an alarm call. We checked it out and were unable to determine what concerned him but he became calm again pretty quickly. We did find a large snapping turtle just on the other side of the fence...we kind of suspect that the turtle may have been causing the high weeds on the other side of the fence to sway and that may have been what concerned Jerry.

 

[redtailgal]

z

 

[elevan]

I know - those goat eating snapping turtles are so vicious!

 

[kstaven]

Those snappers could save you a few dollars and castrate a few goats for you. OUCH!!!

 

[elevan]

Those snappers could save you a few dollars and castrate a few goats for you. OUCH!!!

 

[elevan]

Went with my mom to a friend of hers who wanted to give us some of her garden bounty. We came home with a huge box of green beans, a ton of broccoli, kol rabi (sp?), a huge box of different tomatoes, a bag of potatoes and a box of a variety of peppers (bell, cayenne, banana and habanero). What am I supposed to do with habanero peppers?!? I don't like things super spicy... :/ I was very excited about the green bean and the tomatoes! And best of all - it was all FREE! They even gave us a dozen fertile eggs for Miss Flufferbottom (Fluffy) to set on.

So Fluffy has her eggs now and hopefully in 21 days we'll have a hatch I'm really excited for the potential chicks that I'll get...they have a lot of marans, including black copper marans and gave me some of the maran and bc maran eggs!

Speaking of eggs though...my girls must have gone on strike or something fishy is going on cause I haven't had any new chicken eggs in 3 days! My quail are laying tons of eggs but no chicken eggs :/

And and for those of you who read my journal, I'm gonna let you in on a heck of a deal... These goats are available for sale - I just saw them at the fair and they are so pleasantly mannered and loving...beautiful fiber (imo) I wish I had the extra cash to get them myself *sigh*

 

[redtailgal]

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