What could be wrong with our Blue Cochin??

We have a little Blue Cochin bantam hen that was fine yesterday, layed her egg, acted normal. Today she isn't eating, only drinks and is just sitting around kind of puffed up and closes her eyes. What could be causing this? She is my sons little bantam and he is very worried.

My first thought is might be broody. Does she growl when you go near her?
Its just a thought.......I got a couple of broodies right now. The first one made me worry that she was sick.
I hope thats all it is. Keep an eye open for other signs.

No she doesn't growl but she is really tame so she may not even if she is broody. She is used to being picked up a lot. We did get her to eat some oatmeal. It's the only thing she would eat, she turned down everything else but ate a good handful of oats. I never even thought of her being broody.
We will keep an eye on things.

By the way, how old are they when they get broody? She is less than a year old and has only been laying eggs for a month ot two.

is she sitting on a nest with eggs or were she usualy lays eggs because they can go broody from when they lay there first egg my one went broody about 2 months after laying her first but they usualy start when they are around 2

Two of mine went broody at nine months. So, it could be broodiness. If you put an egg out in front of her and she reaches out with her beak and pulls it under her, then you know that is the problem. If she doesn't, I don't know what it could be.

I think she may be broody. After reading cuckoogirls post I told my son she may be broody and he said when he was gathering the eggs yesterday he was taking them out of the nests and laying them on the ground all together. He said she came up to them and was pulling them under her. We never even thought she could be broody already.
Thanks for the info everyone, we appreciate it :)

BROODY for sure! No hen would jump out of a nest to chase after eggs just removed from under her and attempt to tuck them under herself again ..... unless she was broody.

I have a broody hen, too. She is sitting on 3 eggs in the nest box. Do I just leave her alone and let her try to hatch the eggs?
This is my first experience with chickens, and Helga has always been one to hang around the nesting box a lot, now she doesn't want to leave it. I guess it is good to have a chicken who wants to be a momma.

definatly broody are the eggs fertilized if not you could get some of ebay or eggbid or somthin like that good luck and beth_donovan i would just let her be and hatch her little chicks

Hi, LuckyCharm!

Well, our rooster seems to be busy attempting to fertilize the eggs, but I'm not sure if they are or not!

I think I read somewhere that you can candle the eggs after 10 days to see if they are fertile, I think. Only, I have no idea how to do that!

your eggs are all most definatly fertile if your rooster is mating and you can find out if they are fertilized at three days but i wait til 7

Photographer, she didn't jump out of the nest or anything to go after the eggs, she was in the henhouse when he gathered eggs and went up to them and started pulling them to her, and we're talking the big standard chicken eggs. Can you imagine that little cochin sitting on a regular size egg. She seems to have gotten past her broodiness for now. Hopefully she will lay more little eggs and decide to sit on those.

awwwwwww thats to bad well at least you know that she will be a good sitting hen

Smedgekles, do you have a bantam rooster to fertilize the little eggs? If not, you COULD let her set with large size eggs.

I had a friend whose bantam hens would hatch out his full size chicks for him. He only could set them with about 3-4 eggs, but at least they were content to brood them.

I'd love to have more like her, she is so gentle and sweet and fluffy. Such a pretty little thing to watch run around. Don't know what her chicks would have looked like though because the rooster is a Polish Bantam. We got a mix of bantams last year and have 3 Polish, 1 Sebright and this litlle Cochin. We lost 3 of the bantys to fowl pox when they were young so we don't know for sure what else we would have had. We are wanting to get more Sebrights and Cochins and seperate them from the others. The little sebright is a rooster and he is very gentle as well.

Well, at least you will be able to set her with bantam eggs. Since I don't have bantams, I can't help you more with that. It should be interesting to see what she produces with the bantam daddies you have.

I have silkies and one or two are always broody. It is a good thing in the winter, because they keep the eggs warm and they don't freeze and crack!