Wonderfull Surogate Mothers

[tygrysek75]

I had never come accros here anything about difrent breeds poultry rised by difrent mothers.Few of my polish friends had great succes in mixing up spiecies with fantastic results.Loads of interesting stories to to tell.My 'crazy' friends from Poland can't help themself and keep so many birds ,not only chickens but also ducks,geese,pea fowl,phesant's(not only partridge but also golden,silver etc I had no idea that they exist in so many colours).
Well done to all their efforts in rising all those birds 08 17 .Let me start with the story of mother hen rising duclings.On this occasion 2 broodys ;one duck and one hen where sitting next to eachother.Friend of mine very often takes fresh hutchlings from one bird and puts under other to allow the best chance for them ,so all could hatch without the worry that broody decide to leve the nest before all get out of the shell.So little duclings have been swopping from under mother duck to mother hen.When they all hatched they stayed with mother hen,they refused to go back to their biological mother.Poor mother duck was calling them for few days and gieve up later.The duclings stayed with mother hen until grew up,and this is a picture of them
She also have a hen which rised geese.The story behind this picture is she had a broody and she got geese eggs to sit on
Another friend of mine had so many eggs from his crested ducks but none of them were ready to sit.He borrowed huge Cochin hen from his sister and she was very devoted mother.On these picture the little ducklings had a swim in a puddle and afterwoods decided that they need something bigger and went to the pond.Mother hen followed them in to the water almost drowning.luckily my friend was checking them around this time and fiched out the mother out of the pond.She was in really sorry state
Another friend of mine had real trouble to breed his peacocks as they needed very quaiet place to go broody and before he managed to provide them right place he used broody hens to sit on eggs and to rise peafowl chicks.This are his pictures

 

[tygrysek75]

Please share your stories

 

[chrismahon]

They are great stories and the pictures are fantastic Tygresek. I'm sure we will be doing the same when we get to France, but as yet we have no similar stories. We've only hatched under a broody twice and she died earlier this year. Still we have a lot of broodies started this year, particularly the Buff Orpingtons and (unsurprisingly) the TNN's. So hopefully the incubator won't be used that much.

 

[foxy]

I have often used broody hens to hatch ducks, lovely to watch, although the mother hen did get perplexed as the ducklings made a bee line for the water!

 

[tygrysek75]

Ha,ha ,ha,I cant imagine a mother duck raising a chicken chicks.She would drown them for sure.
I heard the story of sombody having Budgies(pair without any babies of they own) and one day they brought home a little chicks(1 day old)aparantly momy Budgie had a go on feeding little chicks and traing to raise them .Daddy Budgie was not impressed with this at all.Very jelous.he flew out one day out of the window,so momy Budgie had a free hand on bonding with chicks.They followed her everywere

 

[tygrysek75]

I wonder wold you make of this surogate mother

 

[chrismahon]

That's a bit of a surprise Tygrysek! Perhaps the cat will eat it when its a bit bigger????

 

[tygrysek75]

Chris she did not eat him but unfortunetly he had paralised both legs and died later.She kept him warm as when he was with other chicks they just walked allover him.So unfortunetly this was't happy ending.Both look very sweet together

 

[chrismahon]

Just joking about the eating Tygrysek. But that's a really sad story. Yes they do look very sweet together, poor little chick.

 

[dinosaw]

Fantastic Tygrysek, loved these photos, off to bed with a smile on my face

 

[ncotb]

lovely photos & stories to go with them

 

[tygrysek75]

I have new picture for you today.This time my friend was in need very light broody to hatch some precious eggs.So lets play a game who can gues what it is(breed)?The question is for the ofspring not the broody :lol:

 

[chrismahon]

Canaries Tygrysek?

 

[tygrysek75]

No Chris,Canaries hatching naked if I remember well.This is a chicken but who will guess the breed?

 

[chrismahon]

I'll try Faverolles then Tygrysek?

 

[tygrysek75]

Not Faverolles Chris,look at they size-they absolutly tiny,bit bigger than quaills

 

[chrismahon]

Don't know much about the tiny chickens Tygrysek, but now thinking Gold Sebright. The adults weigh about the same as a pigeon and the chick on the right has that proud look about it.

 

[tygrysek75]

Well this are Seramas Chris-not many keepers have them here but in Poland everybody wanted them,unfortunetly ony few people have them as they are a pain to breed them well.Lots of dying chicks and embrios as they have this killer gen in them.They tend to do better with natural hatching than incubator.
Hence this pigeon mother had hatched them but had to be taken away from her as they need difrent feed than pigeon chicks.

 

[chrismahon]

Apparently they have a 'lethal gene' Tygrysek which results in 2% dying early. They don't breed true to the colours of the parents either. So yes they do sound a bit of a pain, even though they are the smallest chicken breed.

 

[tygrysek75]

Just seen your profile had changed again now to forum guru/wise bird- 08 08 08 congratulation and thank you for helping out with so many of great advise from you