First Broody Hen

I have my first broody hen! At least, it looks that way. I have read the books, but people's personal experience and advice is much more helpful. The hen is Charlotte, a light-coloured partridge chantecler. For about 5 days now she only gets off the nest in the afternoon to dust bathe and eat. However, she has only laid one egg. Aren't they supposed to be laying and stockpiling their eggs for brooding? Anyways, I was thinking to put her in one of my chicken tractors tonight, which I had hoped would one day be used for a brooding hen. Should I at the same time put some eggs under her? How many should I try? How fresh should they be? Or should I choose ones from the fridge? Do I really need to candle them? Anything I am forgetting? It will be so exciting if this works. If it does the results could be interesting, as I have one pen with white and partridge chanteclers, and one mixed with various breeds and a silver and black ameraucana rooster over them. It will be fun deciding on whose eggs to put under her. Thanks for any help that is offered.

In my experience, hens stop laying the moment they go broody.

My hens also wont set on anything less than 3 eggs, and the 3 eggs is only one older, cantankerous Chantecler hen who wouldn’t take no for an answer. I took her eggs away and she stayed set on nothing, so I gave them back. I usually have golf balls in my nest, and if I want to test how serious she is, I pull everything out from under her but one golf ball. I then pick up the nest (I use milk crates) and carry her to a new pen. If she’ll stay on that nest, she’s semi-serious. I do not put water or food in with her for this test. By the time I get home the next day from work, if she’s still sitting on that nest, I’ll give her eggs, add water and food to the pen and let her go. A hen who is not so serious will pace over not having food and water and won’t get back on that nest. I find that to be an instant broody break and, disappointedly, I had 2 girls decide they weren’t that dedicated this year LOL.

If I was going to move her to commit to it, I would give her as many eggs as I would like her to hatch and that I think she can handle, then add 4 more in case of duds; it has worked for me, very well. My first hen that went broody was a bantam who set herself on 13 eggs. Not knowing any better at the time, I let her go, and though she was successful with all but one egg, in hindsight I wouldn’t do it again for a banty, hah!

Have fun, there’s nothing more awesome then a momma bird.

Well, we tried moving Charlotte to the brooding tractor, but she was having none of that. She fussed for a while, sat on the roost, dust bathed, but after 24 hours had not gone back to the nest box. So we put her back with her chantecler family and she promptly went back to her nesting corner and hasn't left since. What to do, what to do? We have enough eggs, maybe I should just put a few under her and see what happens? We could maybe block off that side of the coop closer to the time, and remove her and chicks, should this actually work, after they are all hatched and dry. This is all so new, and she is not very cooperative! Are some hens like that - very particular about location?

They do kind of have their spot picked out already so maybe you could try putting something a box or tub in that spot and see if she will settle into it, then you could move it to a safer spot later.

We had good luck this year letting a hen start brooding in the henhouse for maybe a week or 10 days, then once she was really committed to those eggs moving her to a separate area.
The handy thing, was she was sitting in a tub in the henhouse so when we moved her, just picked up her tub at night and in the morning she woke up in her new spot but still in her tub so she was happy.