It kills me to read threads of folks messing with setting hens then wondering why such a poor hatch. Like Carr said in an earlier post. Single mate, move the cock out, leave the hen be. Dont move her to eat, dont keep checking her eggs everyday, they take 21 days. Just keep fresh water and food with her and protection of the elements. The nest should have been made so she has some privacy not were she is sticking out in the open. Most chicks will start to pip on the 20th day.You will see there heads peeking out from under her if the weather is favorable. Wait, dont go in and mess with her. Some hens get plain ignorant and will kill chicks by accident. On the night of the 22 day go in and gather your peeps and the hen. Toss what ever isint hatched or out of the eggs. Place them in a dry area were they can mature. I had a roundhead hen set on 20 eggs. Yesterday she hatched 18 of them.

Patience

Heck yeah Finch Nicely Explained,,, wow 18 damn thats alot

GOOD POINT MR FINCH!!

To let the hens do the hatching, I have to ask some questions, cause that hasn't been working for me this year either.

So You single mate the hen, so my hens live alone, can I use one male between two hens, or does each hen need her own male?

This year, I had a pair housed together, the hen laid 13-14 eggs, with no sign of setting. so I put them in the incubator. ( might just as well have thrown them away!) the hen laid 6 more eggs and set. How do I have just enough eggs there for her to set on without there being too many?

What shape of nest box or what ever, do I put in the pen for the hen to lay eggs in?

You can commonly keep up to about 5 hens per cock on bantams I believe, large fowl cocks can handle up to 10 hens I believe I heard rightly. I single mate for good record keeping, but keeping trios is common practice as well.

Shape of nests: I've used milk crates, ice chests, 2.5-5 gallon buckets (closed up, hole cut in them just large enough for a hen to crawl in but eggs can't fall out), among many other things. Some were square shaped wooden boxes my father and I built. Dry, dark, draft free nests preferably somewhere private work best for nests.

Number of eggs: Doc's article on the Wiki, http://www.ultimatefowl.com/wiki/index. ... Incubation

I have found American game hens can cover more eggs than you'd expect, if she can't normally the eggs aren't only her eggs but another hens; that is just in my experiences though.

Finch, 18-20 eggs is spectacular! 90% ratio! The best I get out of incubator hatches is consistently between 75-80%.


Another great reason for natural incubation; it just cant be beat!

Well it isint always that good. It has been a poor year for hatches for me. Im still hatching alot but the hatches arnt all as good as the one I mentioned. Another thing that has been going on this year is hens weaning there chicks earlier than usual. There old enough to be weaned but there just running them off much earlier than normal. Some times its good sometimes its not. Just part of it.

a nice deep nest bowl works best, something to hold the eggs nice and close and the hen just has to be the warm lid over, a hen can cover 20eggs or so no problem, and your right just leave them be, as long as no eggs are pokeing out from under her she will be fine, i just had a bantam hatch 10 out of 12 eggs,

I totally agree with one exception. If the hen is not a good mother and decides to eat or permanently leave her eggs, then I move them under other hens who actually do their job.