Ebony is broody

Three days ago Ebony spent most of the day in the nest box coming out just a couple of times for food and water and a quick dust bath. I wondered if she was going broody but at the end of the day she was out in the run and both her egg and Flame’s egg were side by side in the nest box.

Two days ago Ebony spent the entire day in the nest box, once again just coming out for food, water and a swift dust bath. At the end of the day she was still in there. I couldn’t shift her as she would peck me.

The breeder chose her for me as he said that she was a lovely, gentle, mother to chicks. That’s as may be but she has a scary, hard, peck. In the end I resorted to putting on gardening gloves and lifting her out.

There were no eggs so neither Ebony or Flame had laid. I closed the high nest box and decided to leave it closed. Ebony always lays in this nest box but Flame sometimes lays in the chicken shed and has once laid in the nest box on the patio so I thought that if she needed to lay she would find somewhere else.

Ebony was making the boc boc broody sound. At bedtime both Ebony and Flame were in the chicken shed and I chased Speckles in to join them.

Yesterday Ebony kept checking the high nest box and eventually sat in front of it. When Flame tried to join her she raised her tail in the typical broody way.

A bit later when Flame tried to join her again Ebony took her anger out on her. She held flame by the neck and didn’t let go. It looked brutal and I sprayed Ebony with water to make her let go of Flame.

Ebony is broody

Flame joins Ebony

Which causes Ebony to raise her tail

The typical broody pose

The next time I checked on her Ebony was settled in a corner of the chicken shed. We had friends coming to lunch so I decided to just leave her be.

Ebony settles in a corner of the chicken shed

When we took our friends up to meet the girls both Ebony and Flame were out in the run. I checked the chicken shed and both Ebony and Flame’s eggs were side by side.

I am rather surprised that these girls continue to lay when broody. With Flame she spent three manic weeks checking the corners of the chicken shed for eggs but continued to lay eggs during that time.

Now Ebony is obviously broody but still laying eggs too. I think these girls are brighter than broody seramas and have experienced hatching eggs before so Ebony seems to know that she has to be on her nest to sit. Broody seramas have no such logic and will sit anywhere.

I think Ebony was then desperate to lay her egg so she found an alternative place to lay but didn’t remain sitting as it wasn’t her nest. As both Ebony and Flame have now laid in the chicken shed I am going to take the opportunity to remove the high nest box.

I will clean it out, put fresh pine shavings in and return it to the patio area. It will be much easier to remove broody girls from the lower level and it will free up the top of the shelter as another surface for the girls to sit.

It will be interesting to see if Ebony continues to lay. It will also be interesting to see what she makes of the disappearing nest box.