Relaxed Farming - our farm in your classroom

Our English Game chicken eggs are due to hatch on Sunday (18th) and the Marans two days later. At the moment these eggs are all in the incubator but we have been hoping that one of our existing chickens would become broody and so be able to look after the chicks. 'Going broody' basically means the chicken develops an urge to sit on a clutch of eggs and so hatch them. Unfortunately, of the five potential candidates we have, three are still with chicks and the remaining two have not even started laying again after bringing up their last broods. These five potentials are three Indian Game chickens and two Silkies.
We do of course have other chickens but not all chickens go broody. This sounds a little strange as if a chicken does not go broody, how can more chickens then be born? It is a complicated answer but it is all to do with the fact that most chickens people now have in their gardens, smallholdings and farms are all 'domesticated': they have been bred more for their colours or to lay eggs and often this means the desire to go broody has been a little lost. We always make sure we have some chickens that do still go broody as where possible, we like to raise our chicks with a mother hen (it is more natural and also less work).
So, back to our soon-to-hatch eggs... We decided to put out a plea on Facebook (we belong to several smallholding groups) and struck gold: a lovely guy in Tavistock sold us two broody Light Sussex hens and these have now been given their own broody boxes and a couple of false eggs. We have had to 'pen' them in with food and water so they keep being broody as new surroundings, not to mention a car journey, may have put them off!! Fingers crossed they stay broody untill the weekend...