Thank you. Kowboy is actually the world's best dog - loving, obedient and so intelligent it's scary at time. Jasper, on the other hand, is my cross to bear...she says as she hears him doing the dog paddle in the hall bathroom toilet again. Closing the toilet lids worked for one whole day...
If she were my broody and the weather is warm where you are, I would give her the option of getting out to stretch her legs a bit, with her chicks, under close supervision the whole time. If she doesn't want to go out, leave her be. Her broody poop will be epic.
We lost our shepherd Kane in January of this year. He was 12. We still have his older brother/cousin Jax, who is 13 years old. We'll see your crazy and raise you two Australian shepherds - Kowboy is 5 and Jasper is 6 months old. Jasper will be our LAST dog...I mean it this time!
Despite...
It can be frustrating. If she can't be isolated then all you can do is check. Most of my broody hens have all the other chickens so scared they won't go anywhere near the broody nest, but not this one. I just check every couple of days and toss out the new eggs.
I'm pretty much an old hand at this so I'm not quite sure why something didn't occur to me. It seemed like all my banty hens stopped laying the day I gave my cochin her seven eggs. Three days later it finally hit me....check under the broody! She is now back down to the seven I gave her and...
I peeked in one of my coops yesterday just to check on things and saw all my normally calm birds scared and pressed up against the walls. Looked around some more and sure enough my broody Norma was off the nest for her daily break. She's sweet as pie when not broody, a demon when she is. She...
^This is what I was addressing, the concern about eggs being added to the nest, which sounds to me like more than one hen using the nest.
I have used both marker and pencil, but prefer to go with pencil when possible. Pencil marks have always worked with my chicken hens, for the waterfowl...
Use a pencil or marker to mark the eggs you want her to keep, so you won't need to check more than once a day. The eggs I will be giving to my wintertime broody will be here tomorrow, so we can wait it out together.
If you have a chicken that is bloody, not simply looking unkempt from being pecked at but truly bloody, that chicken needs to be isolated for its own good. Chickens can kill another by pecking at blood.
If you want to use an inside feeder as well as outside, here's an idea for you. I have two small coops, one for my seramas and one for my call ducks. Solid bottom rabbit feeders mounted to the wall of the coop take up very little room.
Depends on the breed to a certain degree. I had some production reds for awhile, rehomed them because I didn't care for their personalities. Anyhow, they were laying huge, often double yolked eggs by the time they had been laying for a few months. My old hens, brahmas and like breeds, never...