So far she's not very adventurous today.. just sitting on her lil nest being very princess like. You walk into the sun room & she wants treats. Mom put the fan on last night when it got so humid so she wouldn't get too warm. I'm creating a monster! She thinks she in chicken heaven. Mom (i talked her into it) decided that leaving her in the sun room for a few more days was alright. So another 1.5 weeks of being spoiled. I doubt Nutmeg ever lets me move her back to the coop. I did notice that having the food & water less than a foot from her she gets down once an hour to eat & drink a few bites then hops back on the nest instead of waiting several hours between. Miss piggy has her constant food bowl back & is fully taking advantage of it.
Nutmeg is lost!
awww it's so sweet how you are taking such good care of her and what a cute nickname "Miss Piggy" ha ha ha ha :o)
If a Clove does this fluffy lioness style bushy feather fluffing & low kinda grow at you when you go to collect eggs & she's been sitting on an empty nest for 5 hrs does that mean I have ANOTHER one going broody? She got very upset at me when I took her egg last night but i didn't think anything of it. Today I couldn't' find her & went looking & there in the nesting box was Clove. She has no eggs bc she's been putting them in the nesting box & I've been collecting them. If she is I feel kinda bad for her, she'd be a great little mom. But i also thought maybe she was just mad bc she was forced from her comfortable sleeping area into a garage & forced to roost on the edge of a pen or on the tractor till the coon problem is taken care of. idk what to do with her. She's grouchy!
Sounds like you may have another broody ;o)
SSssighh.... great. just great. and no coop to put her in! She still has no eggs. I checked this morning. Technically she doesn't lay till possibly this afternoon but what do I do if she doesn't lay an egg? She has so much trouble laying them anyways, unless she's been tryin to go broody since she started laying. The days she lays she's gone for nearly 4 hours at times before you get an egg out of her.
Mom let her out of the garage this morning & she hopped out & went right to the coop wanting in. Mom couldn't get the door open so she didn't let her in ( the door jams when its very humid which it is today) I went down a couple hours later when i woke up & she's IN the coop. Where there is a will there is a way! she found the one hole in the chicken wire on the west side & jumped thru there. True to form she puffed & growled at me.. i did not know chickens growled.. but then i didn't know they hop like bunnies either & she does that too.
Ha Ha Ha Ha Chickens are amazing in their intelligence thats for sure and yes the hens growl to scare you away.
It is scary! She lets me pick her up still & will snuggle once I've got her in my arms to put her up for the night but the growling scares the kids to death.
Will it upset her if we work on the coop this afternoon? The oldest kid I babysit & I are going to start pulling all the chicken wire off of it to rebuild it.
I'm trying to get it all done in 2 days so I can leave her be if she finally lays an egg. I want her in that nesting box bc I am going to leave her one.. maybe 2 eggs & collect the rest that the others lay. So i need to get the coop secured again fast. Will she set on only 2 eggs? will i need to put wood or ceramic eggs in there too to keep her happy with the number of eggs? Need help on that one.. bc Nutmeg is still on 16 eggs & it looks like she started with 17 or 18 bc of the two we found near but not in the nest.
I don't think it will bother her hens are generally hard to run off a nest.
she will sit on only 2 eggs they don't care how many they have just so they have some to sit on.
16 eggs WOW yall are going to have alot of chickens LOL
another thought... is it possible to um.. borrow a couple of Nutmegs eggs since she has so many & put them under Clove so I don't end up with 20 or 30 new chicks? Or will she lay till she gets her own too?
No i wouldn't do that because nutmegs eggs have developed further than the other hens who is just starting.
You don't want a staggered hatch under a hen thats a difficult situation to deal with.
It's best if all the eggs to hatch within 2 days so they will all want to leave the nest at the same time.
If a hen is on a staggered setting some of her baby's will hatch and in 2 days will want to leave the nest to explore and learn to eat/drink.
Now the hen has to make a choice doe's she follow the first baby's out of the nest and abandon the eggs that will hatch in a week or doe's she sit on the eggs and ignore the first hatchlings who want to leave the nest.
Either choice would not be a good one if she abandons the nest the eggs die if she sits on the nest the first hatched ones could die from starvation.
This message was edited Jun 17, 2009 3:41 PM
o i meant I'd keep taking Cloves eggs she lays. I'd give her the two cream ones so i'd know which was which bc Clove lays a bluish green egg
Every time I see the title to this thread I think of Lydia in "Pride and Prejudice"......
If you are going to give her Nutmegs eggs thats okay she will just be a mother sooner than she thought she would LOL
I have done this many times before kept a hen setting while i collect eggs from another hen.
It's even possible to put fake eggs under a broody then order some eggs and put them under her when they arrive.
I have even set a broody on golf balls then called my friend to collect me up some eggs to set.
I have hatched Quail under a hen and i sold some cochin hens to a man who hatches his quail under them.
Right now i have 2 silkie hens and i plan on them hatching ducks for me.
With a Broody hen the possibilities are endless LOL
well i think i might have broken her from it? She got ticked off when we moved her last night & refused to set on the egg. So i just put it in the fridge. She'd only laid it yesterday afternoon but was off it a good 3 hrs. She doesn't like the dog carrier... I think its TOO big for her & she doesn't feel safe but i don't have a smaller one. We hopefully will have the coop fixed today though so she can sit in her box happily.
Nutmegs days have been reduced to sit, turn, sit, turn & repeat. She just sits.. & I swear mopes on the lil nest i built her. I get her out & hold her for a bit but still she sits there & looks angry.. or she sits there & looks sad. She has a roommate in the maternity ward now. Clove was moved into the sunroom. She is not taking to sitting like Nutmeg. She's down right ticked off at me bc she's in there. I'm rushing the coop so we can put her back in the box. The egg is bad I know. She won't stay on it bc she's irritated at me. She rolls it all over the blasted crate. covers it up, uncovers it, sits on it, kicks it & ignores it. Too bad chickens can't read.. I could just imagine Nutmeg sitting with a lil book propped in front of her reading peacefully as she waits. Clove just grumbles, gripes & growls. oooo i just remembered i can CANDLE tonight! oooo brb.. gotta see if there's anything to see!!!
I can see a lil heart beating!!! an lil veins! Just barely but you can see it. out of 5 eggs I could see one definite, one possible & the others I couldn't' see into. I didn't want to bother her anymore. She was getting all grouchy bc I woke her up to get the eggs. So I'll leave her be for now & check a few tomorrow night. :) This is fun!
Congratulations!!! Nutmeg is going to be a mother and seeing those little hearts beating is a wonderful experience.
Thanks! She's settled into this very well. :) I'm quite proud of her. Sage has finally given up on her I think, he no longer looks for her during the day. He's more worried about teh coop I'm tearing up at the moment.
Chickens do not like change i know first hand about that they will fuss if you move a nest box 2 inches LOL
We had to tear it all out, get all the chicken wire off the coop & while doing this had the bright idea to paint & clean it out while its pretty much just open walls. I also took the time to pull any old nails from the plastic I put up each winter & measured the floor for plywood inserts. I really want to put the plywood down & get some vinyl flooring to put on top of that. That way I can just take the hose to the coop every 2 weeks or so vs all the digging & scraping that i dread now with the wire on the floor. I pulled the doors off the nest boxes to clean out the boxes & next thing i know I've got 13 chicks in the coop & nest boxes that have only ever seen it once. Sage promptly came to find out why they were in his house. I"m seriously considering btwn now & winter figuring out how to build removable walls to just screw or nail up to the outside instead of the plastic. I'd cut little holes in the plywood? & cover that with plastic so they get light but I"m thinking if we get a bad winter like we are due for they might need a bit more heat but idk. My chickens before survived just fine. I usually put 5 or 6 lays of heavy plastic sheeting up on the outside walls to block wind & keep in the heat. but we haven't had a "bad" winter in ... 11 yrs. We are due for one of those 30 inch snows I miss so much.
it took 3 weeks to find one of mine. when i found her she had 6 babies and was trying to roll 12 eggs out of her nest. she and the babies are now safely in a pen.
Nutmeg had an adventurous day! She was let out to hop around the yard & socialize a bit. She has been so mopey that I decide 10 minutes outside wasn't gonna hurt her. So out she went. and of course we had to have the chicken race as soon as she showed up, flying chickens everywhere! She snuggled a bit with Sage, then promptly started eating grass like she hadn't seen it for months. She inspected the coop & teh work I've been doing. Them we took her back in where we had to listen to Miss Mouthy for the next few hours.
Nutmeg is grouchy. Would it be because she's only got about a week left starting today or tomorrow? Do they get grumpy towards the end of this? Could it be the heat? Its near 100 with the humidity the last few days. I've got a fan on her to keep her cool & been changing her water several times a day to keep it cool also. Is there anything else i can do? The growling at me is starting to get a irritating. I can't even walk by the pen without her growling & fluffing up like a lion. She gets off the nest for no more than a couple minutes now a few times a day. I just don't want her getting too hot. I broke Clove of being broody. Brought her in the house for two nights & boy was she ready to get out of here. Let her go, she beat up a couple of roo's then made a run for Sage. Tucked herself next to him for the next couple hours & now you couldn't tell she was ever broody. Which for now is a good thing.
:) SUNDAY is 21 days!!! I can't wait. I'm staying home.. all day. I can't wait till they start hatching. My luck it will be like Midnight on Sunday... and i have to work the next day.
um.. i saw it mentioned that eggs explode when bad in the incubators.. do they also do that under the hens? She kicked one out from under her today & refuses to let me put it back. if I put it back she rolls it back out.. so I'm guessing its bad. I figured I'd take it out in a bit. I'm afraid to crack it open & see.. so i think i'll just toss it. She's had a great few days. The kids were here to help "grandma" out for a bit. Stayed 4 days & the 7 yr old & nutmeg hit it off. He'd sit out there with her & sing her little songs quietly & she'd just chatter to him. It was so cute. He's so excited, he was here staying when she disappeared the first time too.
Is there anything extra I need to do for her?
They can start hatching any time GK... I've never had a hen hatch, so I can't be much help.
The egg she has pushed out from under her.. she suddenly put back. which seems odd to me but i guess she knows what she is doing. It was on the day it was 110 heat index which makes me wonder if it is a chick & she thought it was getting too warm under her & decided to cool the egg down? I'm thinking getting too hot wouldn't' be any better for the eggs than it would be for Nutmeg.
Any babies yet?????
absolutely completely NOTHING. its driving me crazy! I keep checking, I keep making her grouchy bc i'm checking.. but i'm so impatient. I want them now.. not at 3 am bc i'll be awake half the night watching & waiting. She's doing all the work & I'm the basketcase.
i just checked again, she's rolled two out from under her & is tapping at them with her beak. they aren't out of the nest.. they are just out from under her like she's preparing for them to start hatching. There is something she keeps looking at under her rear.. she'll poke her head back there & chatter but there's no chick, cause i lifted her & looked. So maybe just maybe there is another one back there that's getting ready too.
I hear peeps!!! can't see them but i can hear them!
new thread... this got too long for me. sorry.
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1008442/