[princesslayer]

Hello all,

Having kept various egg layers for a few years we have now acquired a 'rescue' case cockerel! I think he's a Sussex, white with black head and tail.

I'm interested in letting them naturally rear chicks but don't know if this is possible or desirable. I'd like to replace a few egg layers and have some table birds. Can they rear chicks all year round? I'm hoping they will wait til spring! I can separate a broody mother in an egglu and run inside their main run. Am I likely to lose all the chicks to rats?

Thanks!

[Marches Farmer]

If you run the cockerel with the hens for around three weeks the eggs will likely be fertile.  The Sussex is a dual-purpose bird so offspring may be good table birds - depends what breeds your hens are.  The hens may, or may not, start to go broody in the Spring.  Late Spring is a good time to hatch - fertility is generally high and the birds will be well grown and starting to lay by late Autumn.  You need a separate coop for a broody and her eggs and to feed chick crumbs to the chicks.  The chicks will spend the night under Mama, although rats will happily take them in the daytime too - depends how high and how hungry your rat population is.

[HesterF]

It's really up to the hens whether it's possible - some will go broody, some won't ever go broody. Very few will even think about going broody until it starts to warm up and brighten up a bit. Have any of your hens gone broody before? The presence of a cockerel probably makes little impact on whether they feel like hatching or not although you can encourage them by leaving a few eggs lying around and hoping they take a hint. I'm sure the cockerel will make sure the eggs are fertile, certainly in a few weeks when spring kicks in you'll see him treading as much as he can! But the big question mark is over the hens and their likelihood of wanting to sit or not - hybrid hens are far less likely to ever go broody although my MIL keeps Black Rocks and has hatched naturally and some pure breeds are renowned for being more broody than others.

 If you've got hen and chicks in a run inside the main run, I don't think rats would be an issue. I've never had a problem with rats taking chicks although I know they're around - just never seen them by day and all the chickens are locked up in rat proof enclosures by night.

Like Marches Farmer says, they need different food for quite a while - first chick crumbs (I use medicated ones to help against coccidiosis when they're little) and then growers until they're POL. So you ideally need to be able to keep them separate until they're about 17 weeks - long after mum will have got bored of them - but I'm sure others don't bother.

[Marches Farmer]

We haveneighbours who regularly lose chicks to rats, but their poultry free rangse around a lot of buildings - last year they found a hen and chicks and put them in an old  water tank for safety and the rats got some of the chicks from there.  This year is particularly bad for rats because of two mild winters and a good summer.  A property about half a mile away has so many rats they're eating the carpet in the house because they've run out of other food!

[princesslayer]

Thanks all. One of the hens (also a Sussex I think) has got very broody on occasion, the others haven't so I'm hoping to put some eggs under her in the spring if she does go broody. We'll see how it goes.

Of course, he was cock-a-doodle doing at 3.45 am this morning (!) so he may have a short tenure!