Before I start, just a short commercial plug for making your thread titles descriptive and specific. I just did a search, because I know this topic has been discussed before. But do you realize how difficult it is to weed through your search results if all the threads are titled "I have a problem" or "I need help"? Specific information in the title of your thread can really help future people know what your post is actually about. Thanks guys.

 

So on to my situation.

 

I have a pair that I had really high hopes for. A few months back they laid a huge clutch of infertile eggs. So I removed the box to give the hen a rest and to allow them more time to bond, hoping that the next round would be fertile. The hen has turned into a chronic layer, and has laid quite a few eggs during this "rest" period, all of which I've thrown away. She is now getting a brown cere, so I was just about ready to give them their box back, when the cock died.

 

It has ocurred to me that there is a slight chance that the eggs she has been laying are actually fertile, so now I would like to give her the opportunity keep laying and sit on the new ones so I can find out. I know she can do this on her own if necessary, but I'm wondering if she would have a better chance for success if I just introduce a new cock right now, mark the eggs, and hope I can tell which chicks came from which father. (Assuming she even mates with the new cock.)

 

Another option would be to give her a box and wait to introduce the new cock only if I need to. But I figure that risks losing any eggs she might be sitting on. I feel like I have to decide whether to let her go it alone or not right now, and not change my mind later.

 

I don't have any other pairs with boxes right now. I'm about to set up a few, but this hen will have quite a head start on the others, so I don't know whether fostering down the line will be an option or not.

 

So, do I let her go it alone, or do I give her a new mate and mark the eggs? What do you guys think?

Hello, Before introducing a new bird, quarantine it or them, in their own cage,

in a separate room. Adding birds into a cocks cage is usually not a big problem

but adding a new bird of either sex into a cage with a resident hen or hens, is

something not to be taken lightly.

Hens are usually very territorial & have been known to kill or injure new birds

of either sex introduced into their cage space.

The way round this problem is to place both cages close together for a few days

after the quarantine period & let them fly out together.

If they get on you can put them in the one cage, but prepare for the fact that

they may never get on together in the same cage ...

Although the above was written with pet birds in mind it still has applications

for the breeder to consider.

Any eggs your hen lays now can be considered infertile, best start all over again

with new cock......B.J.

Thanks BJ, I appreciate the information about quarantine for folks who might have thought I meant an actual newly purchased bird. Yeah, we don't want anyone to think they should skip quarantine.

 

I also appreciate the heads up about hens not always accepting a new cock into the cage they have already been nesting in. I never have any trouble pairing up my birds randomly together. But then, I usually am putting the hen and the cock into an unfamilar breeding cage at the same time. Only once so far have I switched mates on a hen, and that went off without a hitch, so I think this is a good reminder for me to keep an eye on newly matched up pairs.

 

With this hen, I was planning to put her back into my hen flight cage, and let her just lay her next couple of eggs off the perch, hoping she would just quit laying after that. But then I got to thinking that she and her mate had been paired up in that breeding cage for several months without any nest box, and they have seemed to really bond in that time. If they had been doing any mating, I think there might be a chance that some of these eggs could be fertile, and it would be my last chance ever to get a chick from the dead cock.

 

That's the only reason for me to pursue this.

 

So it kind of sounds like I could throw then hen completely off if I introduce a new male now. Maybe my best bet would be to give her a box and see if she will lay her next few eggs in it. If I'm lucky enough that she sits on them and they are indeed fertile, then maybe by then one of my other pairs that I'm going to set up will be sitting on eggs, and then I could foster these over to them. And if not, then maybe the hen will be able to raise her clutch alone. Last time she laid in the box, she had 9 eggs. They were infertile, but she sat on them diligently. The reason I took her box away (besides to rest her) was to force her out into the cage so she could bond with the cock and hopefully begin mating with him.

Edited January 5, 201312 yr by Finnie

It has ocurred to me that there is a slight chance that the eggs she has been laying are actually fertile, so now I would like to give her the opportunity keep laying and sit on the new ones so I can find out. I know she can do this on her own if necessary, but I'm wondering if she would have a better chance for success if I just introduce a new cock right now, mark the eggs, and hope I can tell which chicks came from which father. (Assuming she even mates with the new cock.)

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It's my opinion if you introduce another cock & she accepts him,she will probably clear the original nest and lay a fresh round.So i think you should leave her alone with the eggs that you think may be fertile,it won't be a problem she will incubate & raise them on her own.Keep this in mind Finnie, > "have you ever noticed the hens that lays three or four eggs before they start to incubate" When you notice a hen that does this, well what you should do is take all the eggs away just leave her with one egg so she keeps laying & store them somewhere in a dish with shavings etc.Those eggs that you took from her can be spread around & used to place in other infertile nests to bring other hens on or double up on one nest.The eggs can be good for up to a month using this method.A couple of things to consider > What i usually do when a pair has laid there first egg is to get the hen out of the nest box & block off the hole until i witness mating then allow her access again,finally just because a cock died does not mean that the hen won't continue to lay fertile eggs.

It has ocurred to me that there is a slight chance that the eggs she has been laying are actually fertile, so now I would like to give her the opportunity keep laying and sit on the new ones so I can find out. I know she can do this on her own if necessary, but I'm wondering if she would have a better chance for success if I just introduce a new cock right now, mark the eggs, and hope I can tell which chicks came from which father. (Assuming she even mates with the new cock.)

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It's my opinion if you introduce another cock & she accepts him,she will probably clear the original nest and lay a fresh round.So i think you should leave her alone with the eggs that you think may be fertile,it won't be a problem she will incubate & raise them on her own.Keep this in mind Finnie, > "have you ever noticed the hens that lays three or four eggs before they start to incubate" When you notice a hen that does this, well what you should do is take all the eggs away just leave her with one egg so she keeps laying & store them somewhere in a dish with shavings etc.Those eggs that you took from her can be spread around & used to place in other infertile nests to bring other hens on or double up on one nest.The eggs can be good for up to a month using this method.A couple of things to consider > What i usually do when a pair has laid there first egg is to get the hen out of the nest box & block off the hole until i witness mating then allow her access again,finally just because a cock died does not mean that the hen won't continue to lay fertile eggs.

 

Thanks, PJI! It's good to have dialogue with other breeders who have different strategies to learn from. Once in the past I did have a hen who laid infertile eggs, and I did foster chicks to her at about the time hers should have hatched. She raised the foster chicks real well. I think doing that spurred her on to have her own second round, which were all fertile. It had not ocurred to me, though, to use other hens' fertile eggs to do the same thing.

 

Most of my hens (when they are cooperating) will lay around 9 eggs per clutch. So if I have three pairs going, and they each have 9 good eggs, I don't need to move any around. But I like your idea of "storing" eggs to use when I need them. I wish I had known about it sooner, because this hen of mine doesn't have any eggs at all right now. I had been throwing each one away as it was laid. If I had been saving them, she could have a whole clutch by now.

 

So if I were to introduce a new cock to her, she would probably just go into the box and start laying, because she wouldn't have anything to clear out. (Although she is due to lay her next egg tonight, and I am inclined to leave her on her own at this point.)