Pennsylvania!! Unite!!

At least it isn't snow!!! Gotta look at the positive side lol

barbiegirl said:

At least it isn't snow!!! Gotta look at the positive side lol

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Hey now! This is a family forum. NO BAD WORDS ALLOWED!!!

I think hubby has finally caught the bug and is now a chicken addict also walking around the coop today and looking at the babies he started talking about his ideas about expanding the coop and run and how were going to have the separate breeding/broody pen even taking down a couple of the trees in the way to build onto the shed part for straw bale/wood shavings storage lol. I knew he'd come around eventually. Those babies really twisted him around their tiny little wings! I told him that starting in January, the incubator will be humming nonstop and he didn't have anything to say about it lol.

Another one joins the dark side...

AnneInTheBurbs said:

Another one joins the dark side...

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LOL, I'm sure she'll exercise lots of self control.
It can be a slippery slope. I'm shutting down the incubator this weekend after 1 last hatch, it's been running since January and I hatched 668 chicks so far this year.

As long as it's less than 1000, that's ok right?

dheltzel said:

LOL, I'm sure she'll exercise lots of self control.
It can be a slippery slope. I'm shutting down the incubator this weekend after 1 last hatch, it's been running since January and I hatched 668 chicks so far this year.

As long as it's less than 1000, that's ok right?

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self control? That is something I truely lack lol but I do not have a death wish lol. I get anywhere near that many hatched and I truely doubt I'd have an incubator afterward. .. if I survived lol

Good evening all:

Happy to announce that my < week old chick made it back with moma into the coop this evening....they came out before the rains started and I had to goto work...last night I had to catch the baby and put it under mom in the coop(hadn't figured out the ramp yet)...

On the egg front, had four eggs today....from 13 girls....seems the young ones are producing more and the older girls (all less that 20 mos) have slowed alot...I have been feeding Dumor pellets....

stake said:

Good evening all:

Happy to announce that my < week old chick made it back with moma into the coop this evening....they came out before the rains started and I had to goto work...last night I had to catch the baby and put it under mom in the coop(hadn't figured out the ramp yet)...

On the egg front, had four eggs today....from 13 girls....seems the young ones are producing more and the older girls (all less that 20 mos) have slowed alot...I have been feeding Dumor pellets....

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Glad the little one is figuring it out!
Our hens are really slow right now also.... though on the plus side we took advantage of their molt slow down to do an annual worming and dusting. Some of our young white rock roosters had mites, only found them on a handful of birds but if we found on one or all it gets the same treatment... Molt is just about over for the older birds now and eggs are picking back up slightly.

dheltzel said:

AnneInTheBurbs said:

Another one joins the dark side...

Click to expand...

LOL, I'm sure she'll exercise lots of self control.
It can be a slippery slope. I'm shutting down the incubator this weekend after 1 last hatch, it's been running since January and I hatched 668 chicks so far this year.

As long as it's less than 1000, that's ok right?

Click to expand...

668!!! Wow! I found the best way to keep my numbers down is to not count..

Blarneyeggs said:

668!!! Wow! I found the best way to keep my numbers down is to not count..

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How's that workin' for ya?

I made a spreadsheet when I started with the new incubator so I could track results and make detailed notes. I learned so much this year and have big hopes for next year. Sometime I'm going to write an article about what I've learned so that others can maybe skip some of the "trials and errors". The last few weeks I have gotten close to 100% hatch for eggs from healthy and "genetically robust" parents, much better that what I was getting earlier in the year. By tracking the origins of the eggs, I can see which parents were the best for producing the next generation, and which birds are too inbred to be the best egg sources for next year. Hens that were the best layers did not always have good hatches or robust progeny.