Setting eggs week of 10/1

[3forfree]

In a earlier post I had a pic of my pitbull, he's my ears when the birds are hatching. I don't hear the peeping in the shell, but he does. I locked down on day 19 and had one chick hatch that day, about 5 hours later. 10 more over the next 2 days mostly at night and in bunches of 5. I hope the storm fizzles before it gets to you. I lived in Jacksonville Fla. in the late 60's and had to evacuate for a hurricane, I think Camille, before it changed course. Good Luck with your hatches.

I don't know what kind of chicken is in my pic, the guy I bought them from had a mix of every color of chicken there is in his flock. All that hatched are the same.

 

[TinaK]

Hi everyone!

I'm late (well EXTRA late) to join in but I have eggs that are due to hatch on the 30th. I'm in lockdown now and super excited so I came searching for some other people in the same boat as me!

I have 13 Modern Game Bantam eggs in the bator. 10 look good and had when I candled I could see movement at lockdown. I don't think the other 3 are any good but I didn't take them out just in case! I originally started with 17 eggs, 1 ended up being infertile and the others only developed for a few days and then quit.

My incubator is a home made one and I have had good hatches in it before. The eggs are from my bantams who I purchased this year. I have started showing a bit and hope that this years hatch will give me some good contenders for the show season next year!

I've heard a bit about this megastorm that is approaching from reading the forum. I hope it isn't as bad as they say it will be and I have my fingers crossed for those that may be affected.

 

[Nathanya]

Well out of all my eggs I only had one chick hatch a sliver layced wyndotte, one of its leg is traded and has some problem with its toes I am trying to fix them I hope it ends up making it since it was stuck in its egg for two days.

 

[Nathanya]

 

[HSCMorgans]

Welcome...

Had three hatch yesterday afternoon! After they hatched the humidity went to almost 80... Is that ok? Had one that broke shell an didnt make much progress through the day an died later.. should I have helped? Realizing how new I am at this.. lol

 

[HSCMorgans]

Oh an the ones that hatched are movin all the other eggs around...... Is that ok?

 

[TinaK]

HSCMorgans - It is OK for the chicks to move the other eggs around. Sometimes the movement can encourage the others to hatch! I do stress though when it happens... Considering you are told not to turn them for the last 3 days so that they can get into their hatch position!

re: humidity - You should be OK. I expect that my humidity will spike up to about 80% at hatch. If you have any vents in your incubator that you could open it will assist to drop the humidity a bit. Some people will say 80% is too high, and others will tell you it is just right! Different levels of humidity work for different people. There is no one correct answer as to what it should be! As long as it wasn't too high during the initial 18 days you should be OK. You might just end up with some gooey, sticky chicks.

also - the chick that pipped and didn't make it - most people will tell you NOT to help. I'm not going to tell you that you should of helped... but I do have a friend who opens her bator regularly throughout lockdown, picks bits of shell off chicks that are partially hatched and even picks the eggs up and holds them to her ear to listen for peeps! She gets good hatch rates but also makes mistakes like picking bits off a shell and causing the chick to bleed because the blood vessels in the egg membrane are not yet ready.

I would have left it alone (like you did). I think you did the right thing.

The last hatch I did (duck eggs) the humidity dropped too low during lock down (I went away overnight) and I had ducks stuck inside the shell unable to pip externally due to being shrink wrapped. I assisted 2 to hatch and they survived. They were the only ones who didn't die in their shells.

 

[3forfree]

i did an eggtopsy on my remaining eggs in the bator, there was 8 fully developed chickes that were shrink wrapped, and 3 that had partial development. Don't know why I had the shrink wrap, I know some will say humidity was the factor but I say it was mother nature, It is what it is. I got 9 good looking chicks out of this hatch, and will hatch again.

 

[Nathanya]

well my egg incubating adventure did not turn out well this time. Only one of my chicks hatched and after trying to fix his straddle leg and toes he ended up drowning last night in his chick waterer that barely had any water in it. After i took the rest of the 23 eggs out of the incubator i opened them and found that three other chicks were fully developed and never made it out of their eggs and never even attempted to come out of the eggs. So out of my total 24 eggs only 4 were fertile i was not very happy with this incubating experience.

 

[3forfree]

had alot of posters on this hatch-a-long, and not too many results. Wassup. Here's a list of who's posted since nathanya started the thread, and results of their hatches that they have posted.

nathanya
3forfree-9
pyxis
hscmorgans-3
brookhavens
novanod1966
sandmbaker-4
mstricer
tinak