Today Red went broody and both Snow and Gold came back into lay. Red went broody after laying ten eggs in nineteen days. Snow had taken a break of fourteen days and Gold had taken a break of eight days.
Cloud has now been broody for eight days and shows no sign of coming out of it. She is really determined.
I knew Snow was about to come back into lay as she always practices the day before.
Gold doesn’t practice first. I went up to check on the girls and saw that Gold was in the new girls’ nest box. She had forced her way under the dividing wire. Gold has done this a few times. She is determined to get into the other side and I have found her sitting near the new girls a couple of times. Luckily they don’t take any notice of each other. I have to keep fortifying the barrier.
I left Gold until she had laid her egg and then retrieved both her and her egg and fixed the dividing wire again. I will be glad when the girls can be mixed as it’s really difficult keeping both Gold and Storm out of the new girls’ section. They try to slip past me every time I go in and succeed every now and again. I have to pick them up and take them back to their side.
We have had the new girls for two weeks now and they need to stay on growers pellets for another two weeks. Over the next few days I will start switching the new girls to the other side of the run to get them used to it. I will then start mixing them for short, supervised, periods of time to see how they all get on.
It will be good to get back to one flock again and I am hoping that by the end of the next two weeks the new girls and the main flock will be used to being together.
Click here to see the history of my flock.
Bantams are such persistent broodies! I have two in jail at the moment. Some of them – like Gold – are really adept at getting to where you don’t want them to be. As you know, I’m not very good at names, but one of my black leghorns, now aged 5, I named Christo, after the Count of Monte Christo, as she went through a period of escaping from the run and meeting me on the lawn for about a week, until I was able to see how she was doing it, do a repair and spoil her fun. Happy memories!
I am thinking Cloud may have to go in broody jail tomorrow as she is really persistent. I was saying today it’s a good job the outside of the run is really safe or we would probably lose Gold. The inside isn’t so good as the soil has dropped over time and I never felt it too important as it’s inside. Gold gets through the smallest space though. She does try to go through the main gate when I go in but I always block her with my foot. They do like to challenge us!