Crazy broody hen

[spock78]

I've got to laugh at 1 of or hens. We bought 10 hens & 1 rooster a week ago. They are Production reds. Even after the move, we are still getting 5-7 eggs per day since we've had them.

Anyhow, 2 days ago we here this awful commotion in the coop from 1 of the hens & go to investigate. What we find is this older hen that is squawking at a younger one that is laying an egg in one of the 5 nest. Ok, so she is waiting for that certain nest. No biggie. We go in later & there are 3 eggs in that nest.

Cool!! Had those for breakfast. LOL!!
Yesterday, here is that awful commotion & clucking again.
We go to see what she is up to. Here is this hen squawking at another hen that is trying to peacefully lay an egg. The older hen is just going bonkers squawking at the younger one.
The younger hen is not even in the olders favorite nest so what's going on?

As we watch for a few, this older hen(I'll name her Muther) is jumping at the younger in the nest.

Now here is where I got my laugh.
What Muther was doing was chasing the young hen down to her nest to lay the egg. Once the young hen got their, Muther shut up for a few minutes. Then there's that dang squawking again.
We go in there & Muther is squawking at her nest. Now there is 2 eggs in there & finally she jumps in & shuts up. 20min later, you guessed it, more squaking.

I go out & now there is 3 eggs.
Well now I'm thinking, "ok, she wants chicks & is proud of her achievement", so I leave the eggs this time.

Later more squawking. Me being a newbie, I just have to run (more like crawl) to see Muther.
What do I find?
Muther is chasing another younger hen out of one nest & right into Muther's. LOL!!

This morning, it is already happening again. She is chasing almost every hen to her nest & then she goes & lays on the eggs all night.
Well, now there are 7 eggs in her nest. LOL!!

We want some babies so this is cool to us. I just hope that rooster did his job with all those ladies.
Gotta luv old Muther hen. LMAO!!

Sorry for that being so long of a story. I just thought it was too funny not to tell.

 

[bigzio]

spock78, You just gotta love momma!

Having a broody hen is wonderful.

Removing her from the flock with her own quiet place to hatch works best.

Hens will continue to lay eggs in her nest leaving her with too many eggs and late eggs that won't hatch when she leaves the broody state.

Chicks also need to be safe away from the main flock when they hatch and need chick starter and mom to care for them.

bigzio

 

[ella]

My first year of keeping chicken I had this wonderful Barred Rock hen named Matilda.

She would spend all day watching the hens who were laying eggs in the nest and she would chase out any loiters'. She always celebrated an eggs arraival with a round of squaking. She was a real special girl, I still miss her.

They're so neat that way.