Broody Hen Timeline

I thought it would be useful to have a timeline of my broody silkie, Fluffy, raising her chicks.

• Day 1-3 - Fluffy acting broody and sleeping in the nesting box.  Gave her two fake eggs.
• Day 4 (at night) - put Fluffy in a cardboard box in a dog kennel with two fake eggs.  She settled right in.
• Day 7 - gave her real hatching eggs

Starting the count over from when she got her eggs

• Day 1-19 - sat on eggs.  threw her off the nest once a day to run around and relieve herself.
• Day 19 - stopped taking fluffy off the nest
• Day 20 - two eggs hatched
• Day 21 - final egg hatched

Starting count over from when the first chicks hatched

• Day 1-3 - Fluffy still in hatching mode.  She did cluck to chicks.  I could hear the chicks, but saw no sign of them unless I lifted her up.
• Day 3 - Fluffy clucking to the chicks encouraging them to eat mash that I put in the nest.
• Day 4 - Fluffy took the chicks out of the nesting box to eat at the chick feeder.
• Week 2- Fluffy took the chicks out of their pen to go play outside. Chicks have about half their wing feathers and are getting tail feathers.
• Week 5 - chicks and Fluffy moved to box in run.  Protected from big chickens by plastic fence.
• Week 7 - barrier removed so chicks and big chickens can mingle.  Fluffy done caring for chicks.
• Day 52 (7 weeks 2 days) - Fluffy and chicks roosting in the coop.
• Week 11 - one chick started to crow. Rehomed
• Week 13 - chicks starting to bawk instead of peep.  Chicks mostly hang out on a high perch we put up in the run.  (The bigger chickens don't usually go up there.)

Other dates that might be useful:

2.5 weeks - age when chicks were using a ramp up to the brooder coop just fine.  They might have been able to do it sooner, but I didn't trust them before then.

Easter egger odds (chicken genetics)

A few weeks ago, I got some haching eggs to test out if my constantly broody silkie would be a good mama hen.  One of the eggs was a houdan and three of the eggs were easter eggers.  The silkie has been faithly sitting on the eggs for 18 days now (fingers crossed).  To distract myself from the waiting, I had to ask: what are the odds a chick (assuming a hen) would also lay a colored egg?  

There are several different egg color genes, the wild white color, a blue color (dominate to white), a brown egg color (which is controlled by several genes), and  a pink egg color.  A dominate gene means if that gene is present, you can't tell the other gene is there (it is not expressed).  A co-dominate gene means both genes will show (be expressed).  The blue and brown are both dominate to white, but co-dominate to each other.  If a hen has a white gene and a blue gene, she will lay blue eggs.  If a hen has a white gene and brown gene, she will lay a brown egg.  If a hen has a blue gene and a brown gene, she will lay an olive colored egg (blue and brown combined).  This is because blue is the color of the egg shell, but brown is an overlay to the egg shell.  A person can scrub the brown off an egg, but the blue eggs are blue even on the inside of the shell.

The most likely scenario is the rooster has at least one copy of the blue gene and the hen definitely has at least one copy (she laid a colored egg).  So, if each had a copy of the blue gene and a copy of the white gene, 25% of their chicks would lay white eggs and 75% would lay a colored egg.  So if there were four chicks, three would lay blue eggs and one would lay white eggs.  (Keep in mind this isn't strictly true.  If a person hatched hundreds of eggs, then these numbers would be right, but for small numbers of eggs like 3 or 4, a person could have all white eggs or all blue, who knows.)

The best case senario is that either the rooster or the hen has two blue genes.  In that case, 100% of the chicks would lay blue eggs.

Worst case is the rooster had two copies of the white gene and the hen had one copy of the white gene and one copy of the blue gene.  At that point, 50% would lay white eggs and 50% would lay blue eggs.

Now an interesting thought is what if the rooster had a copy of the brown egg gene?  If the rooster had two copies of the brown egg gene and the hen 2 copies of the blue egg gene, then all would be olive eggers.  If the rooster had one copy of the brown gene and one copy of the white gene and the hen had one copy of the blue gene and one copy of the white gene, then 25% would lay white eggs, 25% would lay blue eggs, 25% would lay brown eggs, and 25% would lay olive colored eggs.  So, 50% of the chicks would lay a cool colored egg of some kind. 

Resources:

http://sellers.kippenjungle.nl/page2.html

http://www.utilitypoultry.co.uk/eggcolour.shtml

Trying a broody

Fluffy, the silkie, went broody again.  This will make the third time she's been broody since October.  My curiosity got the best of me and I wanted to find out if she would hatch eggs.  I've never done this before, here's what I've done so far:

1. Make sure she was really broody.  I've read that the hen should sleep on the nesting box for three nights in a row to prove she is broody.  Some other signs are sitting in the egg box and making a ticking noise when she's let out in the yard, then running back to her nest.  She also might pull the feathers off her chest.
2. Prepare her space.  There is a lot of debate about whether you should move a broody.  I don't have room in my coop and she was keeping other hens out of the nesting box.  I got a 3 ft x 2 ft dog crate for her to be in and put it in the shed.  I cut a hole in a small sized moving box from Lowes and filled it with pine shavings.  The small sized box seems to be just right for a bantam broody.  I cut a little hole in the box to fit the nipple from her horizontal waterer, so she could get water. I also put some of her fermented feed in the lid from a nutella jar and sprinkle scratch on top.
3. Move the broody.  After it was dark, I lifted her out of the nesting box and put her in the box I had prepared.  Then I put the box in the kennel in the shed.  I also put 2 wooden eggs in the box for her to sit on.  I figured the sooner I moved her the better.  That way, if she broke, she wouldn't have been sitting on real eggs.
4. Find hatching eggs.  This was way harder than I had thought.  I wanted to time her hatch date to coincide with the days that my local farm store gets chicks, so I could see if she'd adopt a chick.  This meant I had a few days to find eggs.  But people don't return calls very quickly.  My first and second sources of eggs ended up not working out, but I found someone who was advertising on KSL classifieds near me that had some.  I only need four eggs, so I was able to get some that day.
5. Give her the hatching eggs.  I let the eggs I got sit large side up in an egg carton overnight. I debated whether to wash them or not (some were kind of dirty), but decided not too since the bottom of a chicken isn't that clean either.  Since my kids wanted to help, I let each of them set an egg next to Fluffy (one at a time).  I'd close the door to the shed and when I opened it again, the egg would be gone, tucked safely underneath.
6. Throw the broody off the nest once a day.  Fluffy is one of those chickens who will not get off the nest on her own.  Once I realized this, I put water and food in the nest with her.  Once a day, I take her off the nest and let her run around outside.  Before I pick her up, I carefully spread her wings a little.  She likes to keep eggs under there.  Then I pull her out of the box and set her down outside and give her a little nudge to get her to stand up.  She runs around for about 20 minutes, poops, then goes back to her eggs.  The first few days, she went back to the nesting box where the eggs had been, but now she goes back to her new nest.
7. Wait.  This is the part I'm currently on.  I plan to candle the eggs at 8 days and maybe 14 ( to check for bad eggs).  The eggs should hatch sometime between 20-23 days.

Putting down a chicken

Holly, the hen, had been fading all winter.  Her comb turned pale.  I tried worming her.  I checked her for parasites.  I had a fecal float test done.  Nothing.

I began to suspect she had internal problems.  She was our little chick that wouldn't grow and, at 9 months old, had never laid.  Eventually she couldn't stand up.  It was time to put her out of her misery.

The method I eventually chose was to use a killing cone and a sharp knife.  A killing cone is a metal cone that restrains a chicken so that it can be killed.  Since it was Sunday and I didn't want to go to the store, I made a cone out of a cardboard box.  (One time use only).  I clamped a piece of 2x4 to a ladder to suspend the killing cone from.  I put a large garbage can with a trash bag in it under the killing cone.  I put her in.  I think she expired right then.  To make sure she was dead, I cut her veins like you would for a meat chicken.  I used a kitchen knife, but I learned it wasn't really sharp enough.  Next time I'll use a filleting knife or a box cutter.  Then I disposed of her body appropriately.

It was stressful, but I was glad she was out of her misery.

Thoughts on breeds - the current flock

I realized that I've had my chickens for almost a year now.  I thought I'd share what I thought about the breeds I have chosen.

Gold Sex-link - Amazing hen.  We've gotten a medium / large brown egg from her every day (except 2) since she started to lay.  She is friendly and even tempered.

Barred Rock - Curious and bossy.  She's larger than the others.  She lays a large / extra large light tan egg.  She layed through the winter just fine.  She lays about 4 times a week.

Silkie - She lays really well for about a month, then goes broody.  She even layed in the winter.  Oddly enough, she's top hen.  She's gone broody 3 times since October.  It takes about 5 days to break her.  I just gave up on her and got her some eggs to hatch.  If she'll hatch eggs and adopt chicks, then she'll be earning her keep.

Bantam Cochin - She didn't lay the entire winter.  She's started laying again.  She went broody once, but was easy to break. She'll also sit on my lap.

I had one chicken die, she just sort of faded over the winter.  She never laid, so I think there was something wrong internally.  She was sold to us as a sex link, but I think she was actually a wellsummer.

So, do I like my hens?  Yes.  I'm happy with all of them.

As I gradually replace hens in my flock, I'd get another gold sexlink.  I wouldn't get the barred rock or the bantams again.  The barred rock is big.  The cochin bantam doesn't lay very consistently, but her eggs are adorable.  I like her, but can't decide if I'd ever get another one.  The not laying all winter put her on my naughty list.  For the silkie, the jury is still out.  She lays, but her broodiness is a little annoying.

I might be getting an easter egger to replace the chicken who died.  We'll see how that goes.

Dogs, Chickens, and the vet

Thursday my sister, her husband, and her dog came over.  My brother-in-law wanted to let the dog out.  I knew the chickens were locked up, so I said sure.  The dog made a bee line for the chickens.  I knew the dog couldn't get the chickens, the dog knew, but the chickens had missed the memo.  They reacted as any bird would, jumping into flight.  However, in their enclosed run, they hit the hardware cloth.  I had three bleeding chickens and a sick heart.

I cleaned off the blood with wet q-tips and put the triple antibiotic cream on their wounds.  Two had cut themselves right above the beak at the base of the comb.  Betsy the barred rock wasn't so lucky.  She had chipped the end off of her beak and was bleeding at the top of her beak.  But she seemed OK.  The next evening, her beak started bleeding again after she pecked at some hardboiled egg I had given them. 

I decided to take her to Creekside Animal hospital.  I don't know enough about chickens to know if it was serious or not.  It was Saturday and they were closed Sunday and Monday (for Labor Day).  I packed Betsy up in a Lowes medium sized moving box with bedding in the bottom.  $80 later, I had a chicken with a fixed beak.  We worked out that she must be worth about $18 a pound.

I don't regret taking her to the vet although I do wish I had asked some of my neighbors who had chickens, because I think at least one of them has fixed something like that before. 

On the way there, my little four-year-old prayed that "Betsy wouldn't die and she wouldn't get eaten."  After that, how could we not pay :)

Nesting box woes

Sunny, my gold sexlink, started laying about a week ago.  Her first egg was in the middle of the run.  Hurray, I thought, I have an egg.  

The second egg was layed in the corner of the coop, by the nesting box.  

I put an empty ice cream bucket in the corner to discourage her from laying there.  She layed in the other, far away corner.  I put the ice cream bucket in that corner.  Then I did some nesting box renovation.  I put a lip across the front of the nesting box and filled it with several inches of pine shavings.  I put a fake wooden egg in it.

The next day, success.  An egg sitting right next to the wooden one.