Is There an Egg Stuck up her **@?

Little Ace sitting in a nesting box.

In the late afternoon of April 15th, I noticed that Little Ace had not laid an egg, but had been sitting in the nesting box all day.  She didn't come out to eat or drink.  I told Don there might be a problem with her.  The next day she did the same thing.  I read on the internet that sometimes an egg will get stuck in a hen and, of course, if it doesn't come out, she will die. I read that one could try and soak the hen in warm water, put mineral oil up inside of her, and stick your fingers inside her to try to remove the egg. I didn't sleep at all that night worrying about that sweet little hen.

Connor with young Little Ace

Omelet

Big Foot the Copper Maran

Remember Little Ace is Andrew Connor Edward's little chicken and he is still waiting for it to turn into a rooster, like Chase's chick did.  When we are talking about Little Ace, we say he instead of she.  Little Ace is lucky to be alive.  Omelet, the nasty Plymouth Barred Rock, tried to kill her when I moved the 3 new chicks to the chicken coop.  I went out to check on how they were getting along and found the back of Little Ace's neck was almost pecked in two.  Don told me that surely that chicken was going to die.  I put all 3 of the new chicks, they were about 8 weeks old, back into the dog crate that they had been in since they were one day old. I put an antibacterial ointment on Little Ace's wound. Well, obviously, Little Ace lived.  She is the nicest, friendliest little chicken.  She is a Copper Maran, like the rooster.

During my sleepless night, I read on the internet about hens brooding.  They stop laying eggs and sit on any eggs in the nesting box trying to hatch them. So the next morning, when Little Ace was still alive and not looking sick at all, but still sitting in the nesting box, I decided she was brooding. I moved all the other chickens into the old chicken coop and just left Little Ace and Cracker in the new coop, because some chicken (Omelet?) pecked holes in 2 eggs that Little Ace was sitting on.  Cracker is a nice chicken and grew up with Little Ace, so they are buds.

3 nights ago I read about how to hatch chicks with a brooding hen.  Of course I am starting 12 days into a 21 day process, so very little has been done right.  But the real question is, who knows how to hatch chicks best--a hen or a person?  We will see, because Little Ace is way ahead of me on this.

I read that about 15 days into the process, that I need to candle the eggs to be sure if the embryo is developing.  If it isn't, the egg will rot, then explode the rotten egg all over the other eggs, and smother the other embryos. Good grief.  Trinity said that he remembered in Charlotte's Web that the rat found a rotten egg and kept it.  It did eventually explode on him.  Bridget and I don't remember that part. I think that's a guy thing--exploding eggs :(  So tonight when Little Ace was asleep, all of us went out with bright flash lights and looked inside the eggs one by one.

I reached under the sleeping hen and removed each egg.  Trinity shined the light through each one to see if there was an embryo.  I then numbered them and put them back under Little Ace.  Right at the end, when I picked her up to see if I had missed any eggs, she gave me a gentle little peck.  Just a reminder that she was in charge of them.

The step that I did not know about until 3 days ago, was that I should have collected all the eggs and then put the eggs that I wanted to hatch under the brooding hen.  By doing that, they would all start developing at the same time and hatch in 21 days.  But I didn't know what was going on.  Remember I had been afraid that there was an egg stuck in her.  The blog I read said that it will be disastrous if they all progress several days apart.  So we are happily rolling along into a disaster.  What do hens do that don't have humans to collect the eggs so they can start at the same time?  Hopefully, all will end well and we will find out that animals can somehow survive and multiply without us.

None of them are my eggs?

 Anyway, Little Ace is sitting on 7 eggs. Five light brown ones that belong to nasty Omelet and 2 green ones that are New Sunny's, the Easter Chicken.  The original Sunny Side Up chicken died a few months ago. So all 7 eggs are half Copper Maran, because that's what the rooster is and half Barred Rock or Easter Chicken. None of them were laid by Little Ace, but she will be their mother.
Oops. We might not should say Mother. That means GIRL.

The dark brown eggs are Little Ace's.

 

After candling each egg, it appears that brown egg #5 will be the first to hatch. We could see a well defined chick embryo in it. It is very difficult to see through the shell of the green eggs, so we are not sure of anything with them yet. 

But something will happen in about 6 days; we are just not sure what.  I will keep you posted.