A cornish pullet has gone missing, I think she went broody. How can I find her?

[baronrenfrew]

My experience with cornish is that three in ten would go broody. Ok for eggs, I found they could be "wild" unless deliberately tamed with treats. They are heavy but its all muscle so they could fly and run when needed. I move the birds from the shed to the barn every fall and one avoided capture until christmas.

[Robbie]

Today's a good day to look. Thanks everyone, I'll keep you posted!

[WLLady]

and look in holes and spaces that you don't think she could possibly fit. i had a hen go broody once between the inner and outer wall of the horse stall-4 inches wide....she was totally smushed in there with a nest of eggs. i had to dismantle the wall to get her out and put her into a much more appropriate brooding place with the access to the wall sealed up.
they will get in the darnedest places...almost under bales, if you have big rounds, they'll nest where 2 are touching...precariously perched between the bales, where if the bales shift at all they'd be squished....under the edges, inside boxes, under leaning construction material. if you have a stack of A brick with the holes in it....yep, i have found one nest INSIDE the hole of the brick....not sure a cornish would fit in there, but my leghorn hen did. any dark, quiet spot....anywhere, under a bush, inside buckets, under sheds, long grass on fencelines, under fallen down old asparagus plants....anywhere....good luck! i hope you find her and it wasn't an attack....

honestly, ross's idea of the dog and the nose is an awesome one....i can almost guarantee she will be in a spot that you will need a flashlight to see into, even in the daytime (at least that's my experience)

[Robbie]

Well I found out that the dogs are VERY good at sniffing out chicken turds. But not live chickens.
I looked everywhere I thought she might be hiding, no luck. But no more chickens are missing so I'm sticking with my broody hen theory. Maybe if the weather gets nasty she'll give it all up. She must be somewhere very well hidden. I'm going to see if I can rent a night surveillance infrared visor or something like that, I don't think there's any other way to find her.

[kenya]

I had my one little black Rock frizzle go missing, she was closed up in the barn no way could she escape, no body no feathers a real mystery then low and behold there she is with 7 little chicks. I couldn't believe it, I searched for quite a while because I just had to know how she eluded me. Finally found it ,a white gallon pail lying on its side, I don't know how I could have missed it, I guess it never occurred to me that she would use a pail with no bedding in it. Good luck with yours!!!

[Cliff]

Make a noise like a chicken and hope like hell??/

[Robbie]

I've tried looking and calling, she used to be the first to come when I called them but no luck. :-( The weather's going to turn, it's going to be nasty now so now I do hope it was a predator and it was fast. Better than freezing/starving to death. Strangely I still have all the other chickens. Glad our predators are kind of stupid around here (or well fed!) .

[domineckernc]

How long has she been missing? Have you noticed her disappearing from the group for short periods of time? Pullets don't generally just "lock-in" on a clutch out of the blue. If she's been hiding a clutch, I would think you would notice her missing from time to time before she goes completely broody. Older hens are different. They can sneak away to a dark corner of the woodshed and lay and then tell all their friends to run lay there too and be on a clutch before you notice, but she's learned how. A pullet usually makes a lot of false starts.

If she is on a clutch, it's probably close to the coop, in a place that doesn't get a lot of traffic, that has cover. Woodshed, Tarped over woodpile. Loft. Chickens aren't really ground nesters like a guinea. They want somplace that's up a bit and well sheltered.

[Skinny rooster]

Any news? They can stay sitting for days as WWW said. This is your Easter egg hunt, only at Christmas. I once heard of a hen that got into old rabbit hutches high off the ground and the person only found her after she came out with chicks, so she may still be alive somewhere.

[Robbie]

No luck so far, unfortunately. :-( I'm kicking myself for not figuring out where, when she started to hide her eggs- it never occurred to me that she'd go broody now. I don't see any evidence of broody s anywhere. She was probably found by a predator at night, we have a lot around and she would have been easy pickings.