My good reliable broody hen (a Red Dorking) used to go off to my daughters’ nursery school in a playpen covered with chickenwire with her broody hutch inside. Once installed in the garden she would spend about a month or a month and a half there and the tinies got to see chicks feed them etc etc.
1 Like
Creative and public-spirited, Véro 
Our Orpingtons are well known to make good mothers but we have all females in the flock - they take it in turns to be broody. At first we used to try to break the broodiness but we were fighting a losing battle so now we just lift them out regularly to ensure they have access to eat and drink (and poo), and make sure they are as cool as possible (ie move the henhouse to the shadiest place) and wait - 3 weeks and they are back to normal.
1 Like
I lifted her out this morning, much to her annoyance, and plopped her on the floor. It takes 2-3 minutes to get her legs working again. She was locked out for about 5 hours and happily scratched around with the other one. She managed to wolf down half a tin of sweetcorn and some raw porridge oats because sneaking back in again. I also saw her have a good guzzle of water. If she can walk, eat and drink perhaps I should just let her get on with it as, if she’s anything like yours, she has maybe a fortnight left? Heck, I’ll have to buy supermarket eggs.
2 Likes
Sounds like you are doing the right thing for her, and possibly even if you get her to stay out with her friend she is unlikely to start laying again quickly - after all its natural for them to lay a clutch of eggs then sit on them to brood and hatch them… its only mans greed in breeding hens for laying all the time that keeps us expecting eggs day after day after day!
I hope the other one doesn’t get too used to be spoiled - at the mo, she’s spending half her time in the house, laying down on the floor usually near a dog while broody refuses to come out to play 
2 Likes
Might be worth considering getting another 2 or 3 so that you always have somebody laying eggs (during the laying season of course), also means that the one left on her own wont get lonely and insures against single chicken syndrome if something happens to one of them - always a good idea to introduce them to the existing flock in 2s or 3s. have fun, Wendy
1 Like
Hi Val, I hope your broody is out of it by now - strangely our Orpington has carried on being broody for almost 6 weeks now!
Had the same thought Stella ! 
She started laying again this weekend. And just over a week ago I went and bought a little 2 month old white one. Which turned into a saga. She was already in the cat carrier and loaded into the car when the woman selling her said, ‘Oh, I’m almost certain she’s female’. Er, hello? I had told her point blank I couldn’t have a cockerel. Anyway, she assured me (cough) that if she turned out to be a he I could take him back. Yes, okay. So I had ‘her’ separated from the other two for nearly a week so they could see her and get used to her, then put her in their coop one evening and all hell broke loose, with them attacking her. She’s half their size. So they now have 2 coops on the go, with little Snowy in her own, all on her lonesome, which sort of defeats the object … hoping all will settle down in time and they can share the one.
Hope it works out OK
we have always introduced 2 or 3 together to the existing flock so there is a bit of safety in numbers - we did once have to provide a smaller “hut” in the henhouse for two pullets to take cover in !
1 Like
I’ve got one of those plastic, insulated hen houses with is meant for 3 or 4 ‘normal’ chickens, but the black maran is the size of a small turkey so it’s 3 max really (unless I install a mezzanine and make it posh). Hopefully a few more weeks and they’ll get over themselves. It would only be if winter was approaching I’d start to worry because one on her own will freeze. Unless she’s a boy and goes back from whence she came.
Here’s another of my broodies, now mum to Mick, Keith and Brian … three days old and fabulous timewasters, you can spend all day in the shed watching them. Their half-brothers/sisters/whatever - John, Paul, George and Ringo, now two months old - aren’t interested in these cheeping yellow fluffybums and, instead, spend their day freeranging around the garden with the grown ups. They’ve discovered grasshoppers, worms and low-flying insects so go charging off in pursuit of whatever has whizzed past their beak. Chickens are, truly, very addictive. Nothing gets done when you have baby chickiewickies around …
5 Likes
Awww they’re gorgeous. And I love all the names. Heck of a lot more imaginative than Blackie, Brownie and Snowy. i blame the 13 year old.
Soooooo cute. 
What is that orangey gloopy blob in the food bowl?
centre of a melon and the seeds … chooks go mad for melon…
3 Likes