MIA broody hen & broken incubator

One of the 3 broody hens, who has been on this nest for almost 2weeks, seems to have gone walkabout. I'm hoping it's just to stretch her legs, and go out for lunch, not that she's changed her mind about being a mom. In the meantime, while I know not to count my chickens before they're hatched, I'm really counting on these chicks, and want to save them. Unfortunately, it seems the incubator is also on the fritz! I *may* be able to tuck a few under one of the other two girls, but the 3rd one didn't start sitting until just a few days ago. Even the 2nd one, I'm concerned that these will hatch before hers do, and she'll kill them, as intruders.

So, I may need an incubator, in the next couple hours. There are ZERO funds available, for this. I do have insulated boxes available, and heating lamps, but I'm not sure how to go about maintaining a steady temp & proper levels of humidity, for another whole week.

Okay. There are ways and means to do this with more or less good results. Hopefully, your hen came back to her nest and was greatly upset with you for rearranging things.
It's fine if she's up and wandering around for 30 minutes or so before returning to the nest. It doesn't hurt the eggs. In fact, breaks like that are a great time to candle them!

If you think, or have reason to believe she's not returning, you can offer them to another broody who is willing to take them. Sometimes they will steal each other's eggs, so things get all confused if they are able to swap them like that.
If it's a real concern for you that your hens will attack and/or kill the earlier than expected chicks (I won't discount it, but the chick's peeping-in-the-egg will encourage the broody to switch to momma-mode and the bigger worry is that she will abandon her previous clutch to take care of the mobile chicks), you can mark the eggs you offer her from the abandoned nest and take those away from her to finish brooding yourself.  I'd try to take them at the point where the incubator would lock down, or at the 18-19th day. You can keep them warm with a heating pad/crockpot/other long running warm thing and expect at least reasonable results.

Nothing beats a Mother Hen, so anything else is second best.

I did a quick search and these links popped up - https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Simple-Homemade-Incubator-for-Chicks, https://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/diy-chicken-egg-incubator/, https://www.hobbyfarms.com/build-your-own-egg-incubator/, and https://thepoultryguide.com/homemade-incubators-for-hatching-chicken-eggs/. They are all variations on the same theme - make a box that is capable of holding heat, create an area in which to place the eggs, add a damp sponge, a thermometer, and an incandescent lightbulb or something else that can be left on without too much danger and will provide a heat source, make sure the space will get up to 99.5 F or 37.5 C and you'll have to monitor humidity from the damp sponge. Turn them somewhere between once an hour and 3 times a day. Cross your fingers.

I'll be sending mothering thoughts into the universe for your hen. I hope she returns and picks up where she left off, but hens can be a bit odd.

Thanks, Kristine! I went to backyardchickens.com, and found the idea I ran with - at least, for now. They suggested wet sand & a heating lamp to someone, back in '10. Well, I happen to have both! So, a few inches of sand (wetted with warm water) in the bottom of a styrofoam cooler (that the steaks my fil keeps ordering for us are shipped in, and I refuse to send to the landfill), in my bathtub, with a heat lamp. I need to find a non-battery thermometer, though. I've never candled them, before, just trusting the chickens to know how to chicken. I have, however, helped John candle his quail, before he gave up on that endeavor. So, HE will know how, and will help me relearn - I just hope the brown shells don't make it to hard to see through.  99 - 100°F will be easier to manage, than the 103°F his quail needed, too.  

Some of the eggs were already starting to cool, and were only a bit warm in my hands, when I confiscated them. I also decided to block the other 2 girls in (and the rest of the girls out!), with their nests. I hope I don't end up regretting that move.

Even with all my misadventures with assorted broody poultry, I generally don't candle. I have a really bright light to use indoors for it, when it comes up.
With brown eggs, use the brightest, narrowest beam you can. Using a toilet paper tube to narrow the light from a standard lightbulb or a pen light with a really bright bulb are good.
I just check relative sizes of things and if it looks like things are still living, when I do candle. The darker the shell, the less you can see.

I'm glad you have a ready supply of styrofoam. I'm sorry she decided to go walk-about, but I'm glad you were there to pick up the slack.
You setup sounds great and you're on another wonderful adventure! (It's always an adventure.... it's just helpful, some days, to say that loudly and in an excited tone of voice. It has good psychological effects.)

I can't say much about hens, chicks, and setting up broodies. I currently have 4 chicks being mothered by 5 hens and another hen setting two eggs that just happened to be part of an earlier clutch. I have goals of setting up an outdoor pen for broody hens to set and raise families, but it hasn't happened yet. I hope your new set-up with separating the broodies from the rest of the flock works well for you and them.

Adventures... lol. John and I gave up on taking vacations, a very long time ago. Now, we go on adventures to places we want to see. When things go sideways on vacation, it can ruin everything. When things go sideways on an adventure, it's just another part of the adventure! That's been my goal with this little farm, too!

When I blockaded the other two in with their nests, I first checked to see if there was room under them, to sneak a few eggs in - NOPE!! So, I guess, at least even if we lose all of these, I might still have enough. But, I'm not giving up on them, until after we candle them, too make sure my efforts are going toward viable eggs. After we do that, I'm moving them to the garage, so the heat lamp doesn't have to be working against the cold temps John likes, in the house.

This is why I *really* like portable nest boxes and brooding cubes. The cubes are 4'x4', so big enough a duck or chicken can stretch their legs, not poop in their nest, and have personal feed bin and water. This still don't always work.

If you can identify the MIA mom, you could try putting her back on the eggs. My Industrial Hen who's brooding 10 eggs, is in the coop run because it's only used when we have meat chickens in the brooder. Unfortunately, it had some mess and prickles in it that I hadn't been able to clean up before moving her into a door-less dog crate in there. When I went in to clean up, she came off her nest and chatted to me. I tried moving her feed in front of her, but then took a handful and put it on the ground and she ate it up and most of the second handful I gave her. I tried putting her back in the crate at one point, but she objected. Then all of a sudden, she went right in and sat down on the eggs. I don't think it was as long as a 1/2 hour, but I do think it was longer than 15 minutes. She's due in 6 days.

So if you do find your broody, give her some high energy food and some water and see if that settles her?

I did meet a fellow who hatched chickens in a homemade incubator out of a cooler and was successful at hatching, so it can work.

I have a small chunk of bike inner tube over a strong penlight and that works really well for candling eggs. Hubby candles chicken eggs all the time before we sell them in case there are inclusions or unseen cracks and they're all brown eggs. Check the web for a picture of what the embryo should look like at the age of the eggs. Look for movement while holding the egg very still, as I expect by 2 weeks, chickens should be moving in the shell. Good luck!

If your second broody isn't too far behind the eggs, you may be able to trick her into taking any that you manage to hatch after hers are hatched.  If it's cool and she can't cover them well enough, you could give them access to a heat lamp as well. Our brooder has under-floor heating and we turned it on when we had an inexperienced duck trying to raise a bunch of Khakis and they did really well.

Hi Carla, hopefully you already find an incubator for the eggs or the mama hen gets back to hatch the eggs.
Someone shared a story on backyard chickens website about hatching eggs going from no mom to new mom to incubator and finally made it. Some came out on day 23. So if you have them in the incubator, giving them a couple more days you may have surprises!
BTW, I just hatched three eggs from my Easter Egger, Pinky is now a dad. Sorry I just have a 6 cell incubator and didn't see the thread earlier.

It's all good, May! Thank you. I think I might have accidentally over- heated them. We're going to candle them today, and see if there are any survivors. I'm not very hopeful, at this point. On the upside, the other two are sitting on quite a few eggs, so... maybe we will still have a flock increase, this summer. I hope.