Marlo

Well... baby number 2 is doing well now that he is the only one in the box... will give him another week before I take him out... Mum hen seems to be doing fine. Older hen... maybe she is past her 'prime' and I will close off her box. Thank you for all your input. Baby number one doing great too... when I get a chance will post some photo's.

3 clutches... within the space of 3 months... every egg she laid was fertile (I checked), she is the older hen that I got as a gift off a friend and she is approx 3 years old, has laid with no problems before... My white hen with babies is happy in the other box and this was her first clutch, she's not even 1 yet! Will try with MORE greens, though they have their breed and milk and boiled egg mix aswell.

First off.. Hi all! My First post here. I have a smallish (not too small) outdoor avery with 2 pairs (Green and Blue cock and yellow hen and then a blue cock and white hen) I have 2 breeding boxes attached to the side of the avery and both are being used well with no fighting... however.... The yellow hen (sorry they don't have names) has laid 3 clutches of 5 eggs, only to sit on them for approx 2 weeks and then throws them out.... I can't understand why, the eggs are firm, they develop well and then she decides not to hatch them. I've tried diet change, there's no mice or roaches, she just won't do it. That's my first question. Second... my white hen has succesfully hatched 2 eggs from her clutch of 3 (first clutch ever) 4 weeks ago. Baby number 1 is a beautiful white and grey. He is fully feathered so I have taken him out of the nexting box and I'm hand feeding him because my Mum is going to take him as a pet. I have plenty of experiance with hand feeding (used to do it with my peach faces), but I am wondering if he should be starting on seed already? He'll be 4 weeks tomorrow. Also, second baby from this clutch hatched 2 days later (Blue) however he seems so far behind with feathers, he's not patchy, they just don't grow as fast as the first. Is this normal? This is also the reason I have left him in the box with Mum, hoping she gives him extra attention now. I know that all this info is probably on the site somewhere, and I have been searching a bit, but I was hoping to get some info from someone with the same problems. Thanks heaps, Marlo.