Old Fashioned Broody Hen Hatch A Long and Informational Thread - Page 7

I lost an egg yesterday so im down to 15 eggs under my golden comet broody. I attempted to candle eggs today. And i didnt think it was dark enough and I didnt have the right kind of flashlight. I researched some when I came back in the house. I will attemp again tomm night.

This is good advice.  It's best to work at night and try to disrupt the hen as little as possible.  If the hen is nesting in something that's portable you can move the entire container to the new site.  One of my coops has flat-sided plastic feed buckets for nest boxes and it's easy to move the entire bucket along with the hen & her nest.  It also helps to shade the new location for at least a few days, make it darker than usual to help keep the hen calm & content.

Here is my OEGB hen with her chicks last fall:

Here is a newbie question but I have huge gaps in my chicken "education"...LOL.  I am curious.  Why do you candle the eggs that a broody is setting on.  Wont she know if they have stopped developing and kick the egg out?  I have had about five or six hens raise up chicks but never thought of candling the eggs.  Out side of building a seprate small enclosure for her and provide her her own food and water I pretty much left them alone.

perchie.girl :

Here is a newbie question but I have huge gaps in my chicken "education"...LOL.  I am curious.  Why do you candle the eggs that a broody is setting on.  Wont she know if they have stopped developing and kick the egg out?  I have had about five or six hens raise up chicks but never thought of candling the eggs.  Out side of building a seprate small enclosure for her and provide her her own food and water I pretty much left them alone.

I have never observed a broody to kick a dud out. I also never candle eggs under broodies but have had great hatches. The day I see someone outside my house candling all the wild pheasant eggs then maybe I will reconsider Nobody candles them in the wild so I dont see why people candle them under broodies. Its true some eggs do explode, but like I said I still have great hatches without candling so there is no reason for me to question it.

LOL... I just had an amusing visual.  On the order of a hen pulling the pin on a grenade....  So the reason others are candling is to find that one which might explode.  Ok, I get that.   So I wont feel like a slacker when I dont candle. 

i believe that one exploded under my broody the other day & that was it for her she stopped sitting now i have them in the bator in the hopes they will still hatch. otherwise it was a waste of $50 for the eggs

Here's the ones that hatched yesterday. Also had 3 hatch today under my other broody and a trampled egg is in the bator and the chicks still alive so don't know if it will make it or not.

First batch of seramas:

BUMP

Im on day 9 and I cant stand it !! I want them to hatch !!!!!

I have a big batch of eggs in my incubator, because if you WANT a broody nobody is!

I'm also on Day 9. Just candled a Cochin egg and SAW IT SWIM! Where as three days ago I could see the vessel development in some of the blue and brown eggs, today I see blobs. Not exciting at all.

Now if at least one of my girls would go broody, I could slip some babies under her.