I’ve never heard of a rooster doing that, but if you need to swap out eggs in the future, I’d suggest doing it at night, or else blocking the rooster somewhere he can’t see you. They’ll be more likely to accept the new ones if he doesn’t actually see you doing it.
With my broody, I had to watch for her to get up from the nest on her own, then switch the eggs around fast before she came back and saw me. But I was just swapping real eggs for fake ones, since I can’t have any more chicks yet.
As long as you didn’t scrub the eggs, they should be good. Cleaning them at that stage is tricky, because you don’t want to wash the bloom off. But at the same time leaving the dried egg white would have caused problems too. I think you did the right thing there.
Hi, Ellendra! Thanks for the reply!
I isolated the broody hen w/ her adopted eggs immediately after the “abortions” occurred. She was in the top portion of our smaller henhouse, so I just blocked off the opening in the “2nd story” floor with 1/2” mesh “garden cloth”. (The cross-section of the whole henhouse looks like a wide “A” and the top “right” (roof) part of the “A” is hinged and swings open for access.) So she has food & water and I hand feed her a few cut up grapes or other fruit each day. She stays on those eggs about 1435 minutes a day, so she seems pretty determined at this point. I’m hoping she doesn’t stop @ 21-22 days because it took me a week to get the hatching eggs once she’d gone broody, but it seems to me this hen has stayed on eggs longer in the past, so, we shall see.
The chickens now in the bottom section are not cramped, but seem a little testy at not being able to go “upstairs” @ night. “Downstairs” is mostly that mesh and the frame and a (solid) door, so maybe the birds feel “exposed”. However, I added an extra roosting bar (a section of hickory branch) “downstairs” today, and can probably add one more nest box and maybe an external “panel” tomorrow.
Only two of the hatching eggs really had a lot of “white” (and some yolk too) on them, so I’m left with 2 washed eggs and 3 unwashed. I did not scrub the 2, but did sort of rub them clean. I guess that makes them more susceptible to bacteria - not sure I can do much about that.
“Mom” seems to keep the nest pretty clean. We’ll cross our fingers and hope for the best...
As for the rooster - yes, I looked around some on the web and found nothing on that sort of behavior. It’s almost as if he knows a big feisty Maran roo’ may well come out of these eggs. I like this guy’s looks (almost like a colorful hawk - seems to scare off small predators, as opposed to white chickens that seem to attract predators!) But he’s a mutt and may end up on the dinner table, as we have one too many roosters.
Funny thing about the “mutts” (hybrids) though. They seem more likely to hatch, and, we haven’t lost a one once at least half grown.