free ranging chickens and hatching out

[chasingdreams]

Hey, all! I'm thrilled to see this forum! I just noticed it :) We have a flock of about 17 hens and 2 roos. Our silkie is laying on a mixed clutch of about 7 eggs, so I'm praying that works out. She is in a nest box that's about 3 ft off the ground - how should I handle her w/regards to hatching? The chicks would surely plummet to their death... we have little to no $$ to invest in making a broody pen - any suggestions to keep them safe w/in the coop?

2nd Q - we had to put down one of our dogs - the one that was always after the chickens - so, prior to this, the chickens were always confined in a yard. Well, now that the dog is gone the chickens are free to roam the woods and yard... do I still need to feed them laying mash? Can I just throw out some scratch? They get whatever I can muster up scrap wise, but that's not nearly enough to sustain them. Will they get enough free ranging? I can tell if they are hungry cause they are underfoot til I feed them - is this cause they *need* feed, or because they're used to getting their meal out of a trough instead of on their own?

Any input is appreciated!! :-D

[goatlady]

It's the wrong time of the year for a hen to go broody and hatch eggs. Possible, I guess, and could work IF you live in the tropics. Otherwise the chicks most likely will die from cold shortly after hatching without a brooder box/light/protection from drafts. Hens MUST have at least 17% protein from their feed for regular egg production. Anything less and eggs are spotty and not top quality. You should be bringing them in at evening times for protection from varmits, so set their trough out for the nighttime feed IN their coop and they will come home for the night.

[chasingdreams]

They do go 'home' to their coop at night - I have been giving them their mash still - so I will continue :) Thank you for the input! I just didn't want to keep buying mash if they didn't need it.

As for our broody hen - I was hoping to let mama raise them, but I guess not! I'll just take the chicks and raise them m'self. We have all the stuff.. I was just hoping for an easy way this time :razz:

[Yooper]

With the price of egg mash going up it will get expensive. We stopped feeding our chickens mash in the spring because they got plenty of eats in the woods. But now with everything dying back, we're back to egg mash. With a limited budget, it's hard to stock up on feed so I understand where you're coming from!

You seem to have a good broody hen there! She'll be worth her weight in gold come spring! So many of the hatchery chickens have the broodiness bred out of them. Yes, many of us here have chicks in the house now. Definitely not the best time of year! But I have a funny feeling that those eggs in the spring will be worth all the chick dust and hassle!

BTW, we've never had to take chicks away from the mother. I hope that she will more cooperative than a guniea hen who'll tear your hand off!

[chasingdreams]

Yooper ~ our silkie is the calmest most docile hen I've ever had - she's a sweetie! She lets us check her eggs w/o more than a halfhearted squawk of protest.

So, you're saying that in the spring/summer when bugs are plentiful you do not feed mash and they lay well still? I would assume they could scratch for enough seed and bugs to do well when all is green....

Thanks so much for all the advice :)

[Kayla]

Hi Chasingdreams!
For the last 15 yrs. I've had an assortment (banties, Polish, Black Australorp) of 20+ chickens/roosters that free range year round. I don't have a chicken coop (yet) but do have several outbuildings/barns they make use of. Most of the chickens roost in the rafters of the buildings but some prefer the evergreen trees even in winter.

Our area has fairly chilly winters (lots of snow, frequent below zero temps). From early spring till late fall we feed scratch. The chickens clean up what grain the horses and goats waste, get plenty of scraps from the house & garden, eat a LOT of bugs and relish nests of baby mice when they find them (GROSS!). During the winter we feed layer pellets as they don't have access to their usual source of protein.

I've raised my share of chicks the hard way and don't intend to ever do it again. It's a lot of hard, smelly work and a good broody hen will do a far superior job ANY time of year. Our hens simply disappear for awhile, then reappear with anywhere from 6 to 15 chicks trailing behind. They've hatched chicks in the doghouse, a horse stall, goat pen, under a fence post pile or storage shed, in an old rotten log and under the gooseberry bush. Our cats are fantastic hunters and would love to have chicken dinner but they've learned the hard way to keep their distance from the chicks! We also have 3 big dogs who won't go anywhere near a mama hen. Those hens are vicious when it comes to protecting their chicks. The only losses we've had have been from owls and coyotes.

We do put out chick starter when we know we have new chicks, but sometimes the hen keeps them hidden from us until the chicks are a few weeks old. Somehow the hens find adequate food for the chicks. Do make sure they have access to water that won't freeze though.

If you have a good hen, her chicks will do just fine any time of year. As for cold weather, most of our hens raise chicks from early spring to late fall, but we've had chicks hatched in January! Around here that time of year is bitter, bitter cold. It's absolutely amazing to see a bantie hen with 8 tiny puffballs running around her on the ice and snow. Every little while, she'll raise her wings and cluck and all the chicks run to her and warm up for a few minutes, then off they go in the snow again. It's almost unbelievable. When you try to raise them by artificial means, a slight draft will kill them, yet mama hen takes perfect care of them in the worst possible conditions.

I wouldn't even worry much about the chicks getting out of your nest box (ours leap off a big log several feet high) but they wouldn't be able to get back in without help. You could either attach a rough board from the nest to the ground or figure out some sort of "steps" so the chicks could return to the nest at night.
On the other hand, some of our hens immediately find a new home for the newly hatched chicks and never go back to the original nest.

[Belle]

Could you move the nest box closer to the floor of the henhouse?

Once they hatch, I wouldn't take the chicks away from the mother. Hens are very resourceful and will, most likely, take good care of them.

[chasingdreams]

Thanks! I am encouraged :-D I think I'll maybe set up an area where mama hen and her babies can be safely on the floor of the coop. Should I just leave her in the nest she's in now, and wait til they're hatched to move? Or just leave it available for them to use if they so wish? I would much rather let mama raise them - we raised some meat chicks earlier in the year - what a headache :-o We lost about 6/25, too... not fun :sad:

[Yooper]

Kayla,
That is so great to hear that the hens take care of their chicks even in winter! We have broody hens with chicks that do fine in spring through fall, but never have in the winter. How cool that they still know what to do! There is no substitute for chicks raised by their moms. So much healthier and happier! Thanks for posting this. In the meantime, we have 28 new hatchery chicks in the house (grrrr) but it was better to do this now than not have enough eggs come spring. But my, what a mess and headache!

[Salal Sue]

Kayla, thanks for sharing your experience with babies. I still have to finish the ceiling to floor cleaning of the room used by my 28 babies mail order babies. I sometimes need a reminder of how capable God made the animals....

[Kayla]

Chasingdreams, if the nest box can be easily moved without disturbing her then set it on the ground. Otherwise, just leave it till the chicks hatch.

Sue and Yooper, I feel for you! I raised 50 early spring chicks in the house one time...NEVER AGAIN!

I'll admit when DH and I discovered the little hen with her chicks out on the snow and ice that day in January, we were totally dismayed and figured all would die that day. No way could we ever catch them to get them inside. We were amazed that all the chicks thrived under those conditions, and decided from then on that we'd leave the chick raising to the way God intended.

So we just leave them alone except for feeding twice a day and trying to keep predators away. When we need some new blood in our flock, we can simply add a new rooster to the mix. Any suggestions for what might cross well with Bantie/Polish/Australorp hens? :D

We have a lot of animals and over the years I've come to feel rather strongly about not perpetuating lines that need pampering.
We take good care of our animals and doctor (or obtain vet care for) sick, weak or injured animals. But those that continually need interference from us become pets, not broodstock. Despite their purchase price or fancy pedigree, it's not productive to raise more problem animals. And the older I get, the more I appreciate self sufficiency in my livestock! (This said after putting out $60 on meds and spending the past month doctoring a sick rabbit 2x a day...which will probably die anyway.) :(

[greensman]

Hi, we are just finishing our first year with chickens and have been contemplating let one of our hen sit the nest. What time of year is ideal? How big can one clutch be? Thanks

[momof23goats]

spring is best, but I just had a banty, march out 2 days ago, with chicks. Everyone is doing just fine.

[Kayla]

Hi Greensman,
Spring and summer are obviously best, but as you can see from my earlier post, a good hen can manage almost any time of year.

We've had hens hatch out anywhere from 1 to 22 chicks. The 22 chicks came from a number of hens all laying in the same nest so there was quite a variety of chicks that hatched to that one banty/polish hen!

[Honorbound]

We've done it both ways and I can tell you this: I will not go back to raising the chicks myself unless I have too.

We have a few bantys who just love to brood and set nests. They make great mommas and do all the work for you. Self-sufficiency at it's finest! Let the mommas do the mothering and it frees you up to work the rest of the homestead.

[jbird]

I have had banty hens hatch out clutches in the hayloft of our barn. Now I did not witness this, but the only way the chicks could have gotten down to the floor of the barn would have been for the hen to have shoved them over the edge.

One particular incidence of hayloft brooding will remain in my memory forever. Attila the hen, was a tiny little Japanese banty, as her name infers, she was a real scrapper. She could and would protect her chicks from all but hawks. One evening as we were finishing up our barn chores, my hubby noticed that Attilla was clucking encouragement to a chick that was doing its best to hop up the rungs of the ladder to the loft. Being the kind sweet man that he is, hubby proceded to climb the ladder one handed, the chick in his other hand. I turned from what I was doing, ready to say, "just toss that chick up into the loft", when Atilla went into full furious attacck mode, straight into his face. It was a good thing that he wasn'nt to far up the ladder at that point.

All that said, my point was, I don't beleive three feet would create a problem for the hen and chicks.

[Saminmo@hotmail.com]

to my suprise once about 9 years ago I witnessed a rooster carrying 3 chicks on his back. I had never seen it before or since. There were 3 hens and 1 rooster in the pen. They were a breed I was saving for my dad I think they were Banks but they ould have been any large white that lays brown eggs. He used to think it was his mission to save old breeds & he farmed these out to me

[Indigo]

I had a rooster that used to take care of chicks, too. Strangest thing I ever saw. I used to have about 150 chickens. They had a coop but could come and go as they pleased - they were free range. One poor little banty hen had ended up with a clutch of eggs (not all her own - there were a few lazy hens that would plop eggs in her nest and leave her to them) that was so huge I never did figure out how she brooded them all. Anyway, this old Rhode Island Red rooster would "adopt" chicks at night to keep them warm. They would snuggle under his wings, just like he was mama.

The funnies thing was watching chicks hop from the ground to the edge of a mini horse/mini donkey stall and from there hop over to the back of my miniature donkey. There would be a hen and a passle of chicks roosting on his back all night long when the weather was cold.

Obviously the hens raised a whole lot more chicks during the summer, but they did a good job on cold weather clutches, too. I'd much rather let the hens raise them. And, yes, the hen would disappear and then some time later come back to the yard with chicks in tow. God bless their hearts.

I did lose some birds to hawks and such...but after a few years the stupid ones where weeded out. People used to love to buy birds from me because the hens would lay, set and raise the peepers free range. I did like to feed them up by to coop, though, mostly to keep them from going totally wild and also because there were always a certain number of hens that would lay eggs in the boxes. Much easier to have fresh eggs that way! LOL!

Indigo