Broody already !

chrismahon

chrismahon

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The oldest of the TNN's has decided to go broody with a vengance (hatched June 2011). Been making strange growling noises for a week now but last evening I found her covering 3 eggs and pulled feathers lying around her. Took the eggs and she was fine this morning for about half an hour. Back in the coop spread out over nothing so I took her out, or tried to. She was so vicious! Several sharp pecks and a real struggle to hold her. Couple of gashes down my arm to prove it. Can't believe how strong they are for a relatively small pullet.

I read that TNN's lay about 150 eggs a year. But also that it would be far more but they have a tendancy to go broody regularly. Well we've probably had 15 from her so far and now it will be three weeks, if the other broodys are anything to go by, until the next eggs I suppose.

So far they are running true to form !
 
Join the club! :D

Took half a dozen duck eggs out of the chiminea...found a hole in the garden with faverolles eggs hidden..got pecked by a furious bantam sussex who screeched at me from the nest box....sigh....must be spring Chris! :D
 
why do hens always go broody when you least want them too? :-)07 chrismahon Ive seen photographs of quite large breeding commercial flocks of Naked Necks on the continent, but could never work out if they were for producing meat birds or Layers?

Running the gauntlet of removing eggs from a broody's nest is all part of the 'fun' I suppose! My Dairy farmer Grandfather used to send us kids to search out nests stolen by his free Range layers on his farm.He was a canny old feller and would stand Quietly with a roll up on his bottom lip, whilst watching his young Grandchildren scurry here and their looking for nests. Nine times out of ten they were deep in the stinging Nettles or on top of a dung heap, and more often than not topped by some scowling old broody ready to take on all comers! We would eventually emerge, scratched, pecked, stung and bleeding and more often than not, covered in Cow Sh*t, yet triumphantly holding a clutch of eggs wrapped up in our shirt tails, whilst Grandad remained unscathed and sweet smelling!- well, as far as any dairy farmer is sweet smelling!! :lol:
 
I read that TNN's lay about 150 eggs a year. But also that it would be far more but they have a tendancy to go broody regularly. Well we've probably had 15 from her so far and now it will be three weeks, if the other broodys are anything to go by, until the next eggs I suppose.

Only 3 WEEKS Chris!!!! Goodness, you don't know how lucky you are! Potty Dotty is broody again and I am expecting it to be about 3 months!!!!!!!!
 
Just to answer Lordcluck's question. The TNN's are used in France for meat production. They are not the same bird we have here at all. Much bigger, lay less eggs and from a breeder here "they appear to have been crossed with Turkeys". It is our intention to take our quartet over and cross with the French to get a larger bird with same egg laying capacity as we have. Which is why I spent so long trying to get good stock particularly Claude who is 3/4 Romanian original.

3 weeks comes from 1 week in a cold run and no coop to break the broodiness, followed by 2 weeks before she lays again Marigold. They all followed that pattern so far but this little dinosaur might be different -hope not!
 
chrismahon said:
Just to answer Lordcluck's question. The TNN's are used in France for meat production. They are not the same bird we have here at all. Much bigger, lay less eggs and from a breeder here "they appear to have been crossed with Turkeys". . . . . .
Click to expand...

Thanks for that chrismahon, Your statement reminded me of this, an old Sixties article I stumbled across online the other day. . Churks!!, chicken/Turkey hybrids. . . .

jr_churck.jpg
 
They have some similarity LC. The TNN's in France have a droopy tail whereas the breed standard here has 45 degree upright tail. So perhaps they took the 'Churk' and crossed that with TNN's to improve the climate resistance and the taste?
 
Hmmmm.. . .well, sadly it's unlikely , the bird in the picture was only one of a handful that hatched and survived to seven months of age , after 2,900 eggs were incubated from Turkey hens Artificially inseminated with cockerel sperm. All the surviving birds were male, but were subject to all kinds of deformities and abnormalities. Natures way of saying "Enough is Enough" I think. Certain crosses should never be made .
 
Haha, lol I had to laugh at the comment about why hens always go broody when you don't want them to! It's just for the last two weeks I have been wanting my bantam to go broody but no sign yet appart from someones doing really big poos. The incubator starting to look good but maybe the nice weather may change that. Well good luck to everyone trying to break broody hens I know that's not fun!
 
Ok, we have a problem. Usually we put the broody into a rearing unit run attached to the main run and leave her there for three days or until she has stopped making broody noises completely. Our little TNN is having none of this. She's been in all day but when her friends went to bed she turned Kamakazi. Hurling herself at the wire to get through! Problem is she has no feathers to protect her neck so I tried to pick her up and over my shoulder she flew, landing 20 yards away. Ushered her into the run where she then attemped to repeatedly charge the pophole door down of a rearing unit coop they are using at the moment until the creosote has dried in their coop. So I had to let her in.

Sounded like she pushed one of the others out of the way and settled into her corner, so back to square one!
Any ideas anyone? Thought about taking the floor out of another rearing unit coop and replacing it with 10mm welded mesh in a frame, which isn't a simple job -will take all morning. Would that work anyway?
 
my little partrigde bantam has gone broody and i would like to put some eggs under her but been told its to early really to risk it , yesterday i went into the extension part of the house which is where she is to check for poos and she was there all snugged hehehhe i put one egg inside while i held open the lid with one hand and clean it out with the other and she half sat up and pulled the egg towards and under her as shes so small it looked so soooooooooo cute , i'm very tempted when time comes to hatch maybe 6 bantie eggs i do want to do it again and get the banies breeds i would like .but i just hope kola dont go broody as the rabbit hutch is in use so she will be stuck for somewhere to go as well .
 
dont think anything will work , i have just been speaking to another friend from another forum but we natter on the phone all the time and shes like me she really hates breaking thier circle of being broody i dont know if it can really be done or not , i have put up a post about temp housing and it dont bother me if no one replys as about 10 mins later while i was thinking of miss pringles being broody i had an idea .
the nest boxes on the banties house are on the outside so all you do is lift the lid whch is were pringles is at the mo well if i kick her out of there and block of the entrance from the inside of the house then my wee little banties can sleep in there its about the right size for them and i only need to add a little perch so bingo them sorted but poor miss pringles will have to find somewhere esle to go broody :lol: i really aint got enough housing
 
Can you get hold of a cheap metal dog crate Chris? Maybe borrow one from someone? That's where my Potty Dotty is spending most of her time at the moment! At least until Primrose has laid and then I can shut the pop hole and let her out of the cage. She's hardly eating anything at all at the moment, won't eat anything that I offer her, even minced beef and mealworms!
 
I've read or heard somewhere that the key point is to prevent them building up enough heat under them to incubate. Someone put a freezer pack underneath hers which we tried and it came out warm! A cage suspended in the air to give circulation underneath I think was mentioned, with no tray floor. Problem we have is the large rats. I don't want one passing underneath her and taking a chunk out of her belly. I'm going to build a new floor for a rearing unit coop with a completely enclosed base, rather than on feet. Will let you all know if it works. In the meantime she came out this morning with her friends still making TNN broody noises -a strange growling sound -Romanian for 'back off' I suppose.
 
Chris I only put Dotty into the dog crate during the day. At night she is allowed to go into the house with the other hen. That way she is safe. The dog crate has a metal floor which is very cold, but she still sits on it and still comes out warm!
 
Well at the moment Sue she seems to have snapped out of it. As soon as I lift the lid on the rearing unit coop she runs out. Still making growling noises a bit though.
 
How did you manage that then Chris!!! You wouldn't like to take on Potty Dotty would you!!! She still won't eat anything and doesn't show any sign of stopping being broody any time soon, she's still running around shouting 'where're my chicks, where're my chicks'. :-)07 :-)07 :-)07
 
When we put ours out in a rearing run (only, no coop) they stay there for 3 days, with a cover thrown over if its raining Sue. They usually get restless at dusk, but not like a TNN! Doesn't work that well in Summer though so and its not really secure so I think the wire bottomed coop is the way to go. We have dog cages but they have trays in and the wire spacing is too big so their feet would fall through.
 
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