A broody hen can be both a delight and a challenge for backyard chicken keepers, as she instinctively wants to hatch eggs and raise chicks. Here is our story of what we learned and how we cared for out determined little mama.
When Our Hen Went Broody: A Backyard Chicken Tale
It all began with a text message from Graham.… It was 8pm when he realised that Harry Kane (or HK, as we call her), our last surviving rescue hen had vanished. There was no sign of her anywhere in the garden, nor had she popped round to our neighbour. She hadn’t tucked herself up in the coop for the night either, which she usually does when we are running late calling her in.
The French have a saying, “se coucher comme des poules” (go to bed like the chickens) and over the years we’ve found it to be perfectly true. Chickens go to bed early and often manage it all by themselves.
In our nine years of keeping hens in London, a missing hen at dusk could only mean one thing: a fox. It’s a risk you take when you keep hens, and it never gets any easier.
We left the coop door open, just in case she found her own way back, and the local WhatsApp neighbourhood group was alerted to keep an eye out for her, but, by then, we already given up hope. By morning, as expected, there was still no sign of HK.
So we found ourselves reminiscing about how far she’d come as an ex-battery commercial hen who’d spent her early years in cramped cages, churning out eggs 24/7. In our garden, she’d enjoyed her freedom at last: scratching about, dust bathing under the rose bushes or random plant pots, and living out her retirement in relative peace. It’s always a sadness to lose a hen, but we find comfort in the hope of having given them the gentle old age they deserve.
So you can imagine our surprise when, the following evening, we heard a faint cooing sound coming from under the raspberry bushes. My first thought was the worst, that she’d been mauled by a fox and was hiding, injured and frightened. Haunting memories of the time a fox kindly returned a single wing from a previous hen came flooding back.
As I prepared myself for the worst, already thinking that the kindest thing might be to put her out of her misery if she was badly hurt, Graham crouched down, peered through the branches and said, “I think she’s alright.”
He brought a bit of water and some food, and HK seemed to perk up. When he gently lifted her to check for injuries, we couldn’t believe our eyes, beneath her sat a clutch of fifteen eggs!
Not an injured hen at all, just a very determined broody one. A quick look at The British Hen Welfare Trust and Omlet confirmed it: HK had gone broody. No wonder she hadn’t been laying in the coop for days, she made herself an improvised nesting box under the raspberry bushes.
So, how do you spot a broody hen, and what can you do about it?
What is a Broody Hen?
Every now and then, a hen’s mothering instinct kicks in and she goes broody and utterly determined to sit on a nest of eggs, even if they’re not fertilised and are never going to hatch. According to Omlet, it’s most common during the warmer summer months, but a hen can go broody at any time of year.
No one knows exactly what flicks the switch, but according to The British Hen Welfare Trust it’s likely a mix of hormones, instinct and maturity. If the eggs were to hatch, a hen would be sitting on the nest for two weeks, but could well be broody for up to six weeks.
After all, the saying ‘“Mother Hen” (or “mère poule” as we say in French) must have come from somewhere. A broody hen embodies it perfectly: she’ll sit for days on end, fluffed up and fiercely protective, so focused on her precious babies that she’ll often forget to eat or drink.
The Signs
It’s important to spot the signs of a broody hen (that we missed completely), so here is what to look for:
- Fluffing up feathers: to look bigger and more intimidating.
- Aggressivity: growling, squawking, or pecking when you try to move her away from her nest.
- Losing interest in everything else (even eating and drinking) to be sitting on her nest.
- Bolting straight back to the nest.
- Plucking out or losing feathers around the belly to create extra warmth for the eggs.
What To Do About It
You’ve got a few options, from letting nature take its course to gently nudging her back to normal.
- Let her be: if she is in a safe place you can choose to let her be. Make sure you lift her out daily, to eat, drink and keep her clean. You might have to provide some extra nesting box if she gets too grumpy with the other hens.
- Buy some fertilised eggs: and let her hatch them.
- Cool her down: pop some ice in the nest box to keep her cool which will reduce her broodiness.
- Create a broody enclosure: with a wire cage to replace the nesting box. She will be cooler and less comfortable, which will reduce her broodiness.
As much as we like to let nature run its course, leaving HK under the raspberry bushes was out of the question, the local foxes would’ve loved that! So we gently popped her back in the coop and removed the eggs from her improvised nest.
The next day confirmed it, just in case we’d had any lingering doubts about her broodiness. The moment we opened the coop door, HK made a beeline straight back to the raspberry bushes, clearly distressed to find her nest empty.
So we popped one egg back, secured the area as best we could, and let her sit there during the day while we kept a watchful eye out for any curious foxes that might be passing by.
Come evening, she had to be gently persuaded back to the coop again. But after a few days of this little ritual, she finally gave up on her nest, and before long she was back to her usual self, full of beam and attitude, running around the garden, and ready from more adventures.
For more tips about hens (and information on how you can adopt some) do visit The British Hen Welfare Trust and Omlet.
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