Broody or not?
Posted: Monday 28 September, 2009
I spent Saturday morning (and a bit of the afternoon) at Caledonian Mart in Stirling, at the sale of rare and traditional breeds and poultry. The mart has a regular poultry sale and has just started selling rare and traditional breeds. It's certainly closest to us, with Lanark being next, then Inverurie or Carlisle.
The largest livestock entry was of Hebridean sheep, because the breed society was having a show and sale. There were a few ther sheep breeds - Ryeland, Soay, Shetland, North Ronaldsay - but in small numbers. In addition, there were a few cattle and goats, and a Shetland pony. I only went into the sale ring for a few minutes to watch my chum, Andrew, nab a bargain Shetland tup.
I was inetersted in a couple fo lots of poultry - Copper Maran pullets and Light Sussex pullets - but they went for more than I was prepared to pay. For once, well, twice, I managed to control the bidding fever. An auction is NOT a good place to get competitive!
In the end, I bought a dozen Copper Maran eggs for £3.50. We had two broody hens on Friday - by the time I got home on saturday, both had legged it back to the flock. By bedtime, both were back in nest boxes, looking broody so each got 6 eggs. On Sunday morning, one had given up - after eating her special "broody breakfast" naturally - so the remaining broody has eleven eggs (I dropped one). I think she's going to be OK, but I'm not 100% sure yet. If she looks iffy, I might fire up the incubator and stick them in there, but I'd rather not be running the heatlamp at this time of year.
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