Brood coop part 2
It was a smooth transfer from the chicken tractor to the mini coop.
We picked 15 of the best looking fertilized eggs for our Cochin to
adopt as her own. Now we wait a few weeks to see how dedicated she is
to bringing in the next generation of egg layers and broilers.
Read all of the entries about
our broody hen:
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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We had a cochin hen I was really hoping would be broody but she was killed by a marauding stray dog. This year it turned out to be our Rhode Island Red sex-link-cross hen that turned broody and managed to hatch out 3 of the 5 eggs she finally settled on. Being a young thing she was quite clumsy with her feet and lost a couple of the eggs we placed under her. Next time we might try an arrangement more like yours with high sides that will be less likely to let the eggs roll out even if she does kick about a bit. I wonder if a 5 gallon bucket would work as well.
She looks quite content sitting there proud as can be - keep us posted!
Angela <><
A five gallon bucket should work just as well, especially if you screw a bit of wood to the bottom of the front to make a lip about two to three inches tall. (That will keep the straw in as she moves around and keep the eggs from rolling out.)
A lot of eggs get broken during brooding when other chickens try to crawl onto the nest and lay on top of the brooding hen. Your best bet is to create an isolation coop the way we did so that the brooding hen is left alone.