Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Poultry and Pets => The Hen House => Topic started by: Colernehens on March 22, 2011, 13:52
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Last week I posted about one of my Orpington Hens going broody, thanks to advice, I managed to stop it before it took hold and she has continued to lay.
Today her sister decided to try the same trick, and with a bit of persuasion I think I have managed to stop her, but only time will tell.
As we only have 2 laying Hens(although we have 3 in totally), if one goes broody, we loose half our daily egg supply. We want to increase our number, but really want to stick with soft feather Heavy breeds (I have a real fear of them flying and wing flapping), are there any of the large breeds that aren't so prone to broodiness? Or is it a characteristic we are just going to have to except? :unsure:
Any advice would be gladly received.
Thanks for making us so welcome, its good to know such good advice is at hand.
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A lot of the large heavy soft feather breeds (Orps, Brahma, Cochin) are known for their broodiness. Wyandottes also belong to this case category, and are not quite so broody, but they do still make good mums.
You could try large fowl Faverolles. They are not known as flyers, and are quite weighty (they are a traditional dual purpose bird)... but I couldn't speak to their broodiness :)
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Also check out some of your local strains of large breeds - some strains are more prone to broodiness than others. When I was looking for my chickens I narrowed it down by breed, but then different local breeders claimed that they had a strain of (for example) silver laced Wyandottes that didn't go boody, whereas their gold laced ones did.
Also our local Light Sussex are meant to be a lot less broody than the Speckled Sussex (I don't know if this is universally true, or just the local strains).
Non-broodiness was one of my criteria when selecting breeds but I don't know if my plan has worked as mine haven't started laying yet. Time will tell.
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Every large breed i've had/ bundle of feathers have been brilliant broodies. They spent more time in the spring/summer arguing over who was mother than laying eggs! My gold brahma hen Evil Eva was useless as an egg layer! I love them dearly as a breed but egg production is a hit & miss affair. My Orpies (barbara & Margo) wasn't much better.
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We have three hens all LF orpingtons and we get 2 to 3 eggs per day since third week in january missing only really cold days when they go on strike. Longer term I cannot say yet as its our first year but I thought I should mention our current results if it helps.