to cold to hatch outside with hen in coop?

[AddictingChickens]

Hello!

I have 5 bantam hens and one docile rooster (bantam also) and my girls are taking turns (accept for the past two days) sitting on 5 or 7 confirmred fertile eggs. My concern is that it is cold in massachusetts and the little eggs wont hatch and stay warm/alive if I keep them in the coop. I do not want to intervien and wish it was warmer. Should I snatch them up and buy a brudder (sp?) and do that instead of let nature take its' course? I have never donet his before - my first wiinter with my girls.

Any recommendations on what to do would be great. I knwo brudders are trickey from a humidity/temp perspective and with me being a newbie, I'm concerned I would over or under do it ...

Thanks!!

 

[midget_farms]

I would recommend letting the hens do the work at this point. You will probably have some that dont hatch and some that die in the first few days. This is normal & you should be prepared for this no matter what method of brooding you use.

The hens however know its cold & they will take care of the chicks.

 

[AddictingChickens]

Thank you for your input -

It is pretty darn cold outside - only low 40's during the day.(Burb of Boston) I heard some peeping in the coop but did not see anything however I did find half a shell that looked like a baby chick might have hatched. Problem is, I have a total of three super broody hens sitting on this batch of eggs. Two of them are cochins and one never gets up and the other rarely gets up. The third one - not a cochin - comes and goes and then shoves herself in between them so she can sit on the eggs too.

QUESTIONs:
Do I need to be concerned with the cold weather since there seems to be three that want to take care of them
Should I pick one hen and separate her and the eggs in the coop from the other hens and roo and have her be the dedicated "mom"?
I have pine shavings in there now, should I change the bedding to something else so the chicks that do survive, wont eat it and die?
Should I feed them medicated chick feed?

Thank you again,
Jenine