Monday I noticed the mean mama hen had been off her nest most of the day so I went back to the house, got a bright flashlight and “candled” the eggs. Holding a bright light to the egg shell allows you to see if there’s anything in there. One egg had what looked like a baby that had started developing but didn’t finish and the remaining 14 or so eggs had nothing. They either weren’t fertile, which I can understand because there’s about 20 chickens out there and just poor old Wilbur to do all the work of fertilizing all those eggs.
The other mama has two babies and they were up walking around so I candled her eggs. I think there were 6 left. One looked like it had a chance of hatching but she never went back to the nest so I tossed all those eggs. We have two baby chicks. They’re so darned cute!
Mean Mama Hen
But, mean mama hen decided she’d start over but this time, she got into a nest with three golf balls and she’s faithfully sitting on those golf balls. A couple of times a day, I risk losing a hand by scooting her off the nest to see if there are any real eggs. She’s had her chance . . I’m not giving her any more eggs to sit on. Good luck with those golf balls! 🙂
Joyce says
Poor Wilbur! The girls wore him out…LOL Enjoy your babies!
Karin Vail says
I had a Welsummer hen – who I let hatch some eggs. She promptly killed the babies as they hatched. So, the next time she went broody, I took her eggs half way through and incubated/hatched them myself. I should have kept a replacement hen because that hen was ALWAYS going broody, but she was the prettiest to look at and would lay the darkest chocolate brown eggs. ::sigh:: I do miss having chickens, even with mean ones amongst them…..
DonnainKS says
I just made a comment about the wonderful animal ‘mama’ you are and then I read what you’re doing to this poor hen!!! LOL If she figures the ruse out, she may really get mean. LOL
Nelle Coursey says
You are too funny!!
Dar in MO says
Poor mean momma hen. I wonder if those are still some of the Missouri golf balls she is sitting on?
dezertsuz says
Two – replacement value for two mamas. None of the others wanted to sit on eggs, then? Not a bad deal.