Rhode Island Red Chicks Hatch (Blog 412)

What do you do when a hen tries to incubate eggs that haven't been fe

rtilized by a rooster? That's what happened to Elaine and me back in late August when one of her heritage Rhode Island Red hens, Mary, became broody.

No rooster had been in Mary's run since April, and, of course, that meant none of the eggs that Mary had so diligently gathered would hatch. Knowing that Mary would not stop being broody until she actually hatched chicks, Elaine and I decided to put three eggs in our mini-incubator  and see what happened. Those eggs were taken from the pen of our alpha rooster, Don, and two of those eggs hatched, one on October 3, the other on October 5.

So we replaced Mary's dud eggs with the two chicks, and she had no problem adopting them. We hope that Mary and her chicks can go outside to live by Thanksgiving.