This is Angel – the fourth year she’s gone broody so she knows all about it. I ‘set’ her on Monday night on 9 eggs; I use an odd number as an even number of eggs will never sit close together – one is always pushed out. I have been keeping hens since I was 18. Setting a broody is still a great pleasure. It is no good leaving a broody in the henhouse nesting box as the other hens start laying alongside and the new eggs get muddled up with the hatching ones and you end up half hatched or handled when the time comes. They all need to hatch within 24 hours, then she will take the chicks to eat and set up a new nesting place in her ark. The chicks are born with enough food to keep them going for 24 hours – nature is so wonderful – they are due on 21st April.