Red Pile Chickens

Do hens lay any less often when no rooster is present?

I just made an interesteing find. I didn't know they would do this, but both hens are on the same nest right now setting. You ever have 'em do that? haha.

Now I'm just confused.. the rooster is setting on the nest with the two hens now...

Maybe this is an effort to keep himself warm?

Yep, I have hens who share nests all of the time. I've had hen chickens try to share nests with hen ducks (which causes problems because duck eggs take a week longer to hatch than chicken eggs)....and I've had a hen chicken actually hatch baby ducks. I used to have one hen that was a very poor layer herself, but would seem to wait until another hen had a full nest, and then boot her off and sit on it, lol....but she was an excellent Mom, so I kept her around. She could keep a group of 15 chicks all together and raise them. My hen turkeys always share a common nest.

But the rooster on the nest, well.....that's just weird. LOL.

Ha, thats pretty interesting. I wouldn't have thought a chicken would hatch a ducks eggs. Yeah, the rooster wasn't on there this morning when I checked. I had bad timing on letting them hatch a nest, it is so cold here right now. I thought the cold weather was over, but it came back strong this weekend.

You'd be amazed at how well those hens keep the eggs warm....if they are sitting on the nest, it has to get mighty cold to hurt the eggs. If my hens can hatch out spring babies here in Iowa, you should have no problem in NC.

Somewhere, I have some pics of one of my hens with baby ducks under her....I didn't worry about her raising ducklings, but a Mama duck raising chicks is another story....chicks don't take well to swimming, lol.

Haha, have you had a duck try to take chicks swimming?

Originally Posted by Chris Steele

Do hens lay any less often when no rooster is present?

I think its funny how this thread is just a conversation between us two..

Originally Posted by Chris Steele

Haha, have you had a duck try to take chicks swimming?

Yep, had it happen once, it didn't turn out well for the chicks. They don't know any better, and the poor mama duck was utterly confused....my daughter came running in the house after trying to rescue the chicks and getting attacked by the mama duck, lol. I think we ended up saving 3 of the chicks, and raising them under a brooder.

Ah, thats sad. Good that ya got three of 'em though.