Dom T

YES @Beantree! Thanks so much Thanks for the tips too! Draft free chickens here we come!

@Luvachicken thank you we are very lucky to live in the French Alps @Cat tails run split in two, check! Pot on the nest, check! Watch this space! At the moment whenever we usher them out, or they are in the separated run they settle like this cuddled up together We will try this for a period, a sort of internal broody cage, before we ask a friend to borrow a 'broody cage' which @Beantreewe will transfer to a holding place! Thank for the tip! Ohe while I am here do you have a link for any draught netting sounds like it would be a great idea! Thanks Team! Love Dom, Dotty, Brownie, Fluffy and family

Okay I think the penny has dropped. @Cat tails @Beantree Attached is chicken run 1.0 so we build a partition where the yellow X is put some shade up. Broody hens go there for the day and back in at night. Non broody hens go on the other side. We try this for 3 days. For us this is not really an egg issue, more a general concern of welfare issue. 6 weeks seems a long time for Brownie to want to be in the coop the whole time. I guess this is a natural occurrence so we are equally happy to let it run its course however 6 weeks seems like a record so worth trying to give her a hand. @Beantreeforgot to ask how did reintroducing your broody hen go the other day.

@Beantree I think if broody were out of 10. Brownie is full 10/10 and Fluffy seems to have joined at around 6/10. They live with Dotty who is carrying on as normal We are on day 2 of keeping to door to the Omlet shut during the day, letting them roam in the run and outside the run when we are around. Does that sound okay? It does mean that no chicken can access the nesting box which is within the Omlet during the day, I figure if one of them has to lay would go ahead and do it in the run or outside the run or early morning or eve when we open the Omlet back up. Maybe I have that figured wrong and should let Fluffy have a sit in there as we are 90% sure she she has turned Broody rather than just taking a looooong time to lay

Thanks @Cat tails Feels very supporting to know others have been through this I am sure that I am finding it much more stressful than it needs to be! 🤣

Thanks @Cat tails Day 1 of day time Omlet closure! @Beantree ah, did not realise how deep this runs at the moment she is just sat outside the Omlet presumably waiting for me to open the door Will try a few days of Omlet door closure and if that does not work, take her further away. Thank you both so much for your advice, who new having chickens could feel like having extra kids!

Thanks Cat Tails! Sounds like more time out of the coop should see us good

One of our hens has been in coop for well over a month now. We get her out everyday, have tried bathing her in cool water, putting cool packs ice packs under the nest, all that this omlet post suggests apart from the the 'broody enclosure'. Today marks 6 weeks, I read that after 3 weeks she should be over the broody phase, when she did not stop after week 3 we let it run for another cycle. She seems fine herself in fact she looks really healthy. My question is, how concerned should I be? Should we let it run it's course? Is there an alternative, perhaps doing the ice packs and cool baths daily rather than weekly or should we be trying the 'broody enclosure' for 3 days which seems a bit extreme to me. Many thanks for all and any advice :)

Thank you all for your advice Our chickens seem even happier recently. Much more time outside and we have let them free range a bit too, though we stand there like life guards just in case 😆

Hi @Beantree just to check 😀 So dustpan and brush daily. Tip poo into compost. Deep clean once a week. As for the bedding .... We put straw just in the nesty bit of a coop (the divot), I think that is the right thing to do? They kick most of it down into the tray, so do we stick that in the compost too? I am sure I read somewhere folks put that into the run however once soiled I am not sure it was, though it would help soak up a bit of mud in the run. @mullethunter your Fluffy is a beaut! @Luvachicken @mullethunter can I ask do you have to clean Bantums feet from time to time? I am sure I read somewhere that was a thing? Maybe it was a lice thing? Thank you all, getting to be a more confident chicken parent daily!

@Luvachicken aw go on then 😀 presenting Fluffy, Brownie and Dotty 😀

Was reading this with my wife and she said what a lovely forum thank you @Cat tails @mullethunter @Beantree for your advice and support. @Cat tails @mullethunter nice to hear from you and thank you again for your support. Super reassuring to hear that as long as food and water are covered we are okay @Cat tails We have 3 Pekin Bantams 😀 My wife now reckons the newly introduced hen (Dotty) might be younger than the others as she is smaller and perhaps her comb has yet to grow). @Beantree So interesting about the drafts, I had not seen that elsewhere, makes a lot of sense. Will pop up a windbreak and see if we get to see more of them. Again all thank you so much for your time and learned advice.

I could not get the book on chicken rearing that Omlet recommends in their online shop so I read another and have a host of newbie questions, sorry. To get perspective we have 3 bantams, an Eglu Go and a homemade run of about around 8m2. The book was not written for Omlet owners so .... "As a rule-of-thumb, you'll need about half a cup of feed and two cups of water per chicken per day, plus a bit extra (just in case)." This amount would get lost in the Omlet provided containers am I better off buying others. I am worried the water/food would be too deep down for the Bantams to get to if I put that amount in the ones that came with the Eglu Go Daily tasks "clean up the worst of the droppings under the roost", how much of a clean should I be doing? Sweeping out the tray, dusting off the roosting bars and disinfecting/full wash down once a week? I would say about 50% of the day maybe more the hens are in the coop, does this seem right? It is cold (we are in the French Alps and it is freezing every night unseasonably at the moment) and we have only had them a week so that is what I put it down to weather and settling in. Whenever we go out to see them, they come out. We got 2 hens a week ago. Then introduced another. The new hen (also a bantum) is smaller, has previously been hen pecked a little - a few missing feathers on her head, looks like her comb has been pecked too almost to nothing (if that is even possible). When introduced to the other two they pecked her a bit too. Though it seems to be getting better, I figured I might as well ask for any advice to help stop her getting pecked since I am here

@Luvachicken thank you Can't wait!

@Luvachicken aw thank for verifying that @mullethunter good point on the hinges, I have rewatched fantastic Mr Fox in the name of research ha ha and have maybe underestimated their strength and cunning so will have to make a chicken fort knox! @Cat tails great idea! The run currently looks out over the road, would that cause an issue, do chickens scare when they see cars coming? For context the road maybe has 10 cars that come by a day and at 10 mph max! Otherwise I reckon thanks to all your advice we are good to build!