Hatching eggs

[Sharon Yorks]

When putting a rooster in with a pullet that has never been bred before, how many days do you leave them together before you would start collecting hatching eggs? How many days until you can feel pretty assured that her eggs would be fertile? --Sharon

[Mike Gilbert]

Assuming the pullet has not been with any other roosters?   I would be comfortable saving eggs after the first two or three are laid.    But I once had a bantam pullet, when she first started laying,  steal a nest in the weeds and hatched off a clutch of a dozen or so chicks - I think all the eggs hatched.