Simulated Natural Nest Incubation~Experiment #1 So it begins....

[Lacy Blues]

Well, I found this thread and over the past few hours have read the whole thing.

Bee, I'm excited for you on this one! March 21st, right?

I was going to ask you to provide details on the depth of dirt used etc... but you already did.

So, now I'm subscribed and I will definitely keep up with this thread rather than try to catch up.

Yellow incandescent lights in a flashlight size? I haven't seen any of those. Where would I get one? Sometimes, even though my birds lay white eggs, I have a hard time seeing what's going on inside when I'm looking for movement. If I have a brown egg from my yard birds, it's next to impossible, let alone a maran egg! My goodness! I need a yellow light!

 

[aart]

Bee, if I may I learner something when I hatched out my Maran eggs. If you are using an LED flashlight, try using a very strong light with a yellow incandescent bulb instead. My dad explained it to me pretty clearly being the science whiz he is... Blue light scatters and reflects off of lots of things making it hard to see in that light. If you have a fog, a blue light may light up the immediate area better but the scattering wavelengths will actually reduce your ability to see details. An orange/yellow light will not scatter as much and will pass through an egg more clearly.

I tried every bright LED I had to candle Maran eggs once, no dice. My mom brought by her HUGE incandescent maglight. Full size and it looked downright dim compared to my fancy lights with 5LEDs... But I saw right through those thick brown shells and I saw veins and chicks moving!

Remember that people once used CANDLES to candle eggs. Those aren't very bright either but the wavelengths aren't as blue as modern lights so they saw through the shells. The closer to true white the better but I suspect yellow wavelengths of light are better for candling than blue.

Great info...and makes sense and affirms what I found with my experimentation trying a variety of lights and the warmer incandescent worked best.

I think candling takes practice/experience and patience...the more you do it the more you start to recognize what you are seeing.
The most amazing candling pics I've see on the net are usually white banty eggs...so no comparison to the brown LF eggs.
Blue/green eggs are pretty much impossible in my experience ...so you just keep them going and you'll find out on day 24-25 whether they are viable or not...lol

 

[ronott1]

Excellent information!!! Why aren't they telling folks about that in these incubation threads?

The light color post assumes that the led bulbs in LEDs is blue. Modern LEDs are measured in Kelvin numbers and go from yellow to blue for the white light spectrum.

If you want to candle a marans egg, buy a real candler. Brinsea sells one and I can see into very dark eggs with it. The High intensity Occa view has dedicated bulbs and you have to use very fresh batteries. They are designed for seeing into eggs.

 

[Aacre]

Wow! How long was it on that temp?

You know what I'd like? I'd like to see clear, large egg pics of brown eggs being incubated and what they are supposed to look like....mine don't look anything like all the white eggs they show. No spidery network of veins can be visualized, no definite chick shape or really dark eyeball or anything like that.

I have dark and darker, a yolk shape, or a bigger, darker murky thingy and sometimes I see a little darker eyeball sized thing in there but it doesn't seem to be connected to much of anything. Every once in awhile I can see a line of red here and there but it's not a ring or any such...just one line here or there.

I'm using flashlights so bright they nearly blind you to look at them, so it's not my lights...I'm just not seeing the distinct features that other folks are seeing. Now, I'm seeing more in some of the eggs than I ever have....meaning a blood vessel piece here and there, more darkness than a mere yolk would show, the occasional floaty dark BB type thingy that I suppose would be an eye...or could be a blood spot...or a meat spot or just who knows?

This is frustrating....

What day are you on again? 7? 8? It's hard for me to keep track because I know a few people who are incubating eggs. I have found that even in the lightest brown eggs it's difficult to make much out. I've got a clutch of eggs in the incubator and they will be starting day 4 today around noon. Your's should be more advanced than what mine are (if I remember correctly). I can't help you right away, but I can share pics of them when I get there. I normally don't candle earlier than day 7 because 1. There's not much development on day 7, and 2. Sometimes, in my experience so far (not much at all), you won't see much veining until day 10-14. They seem to "explode" with veins by then!
I went ahead and took one of my brown eggs out and candled it to show you what they look like at the end of day 3 (just this morning). I won't say anything or point anything out, because I want to see if you can see anything in it before I say what I see/don't see. Note: my phone camera isn't very good, so quality of pics aren't that great either.
My brown egg that I candled.

Same egg, candled. Note: this egg is just a little bit porous.

 

[Beekissed]

Thank you! Mine didn't look like that at day 3....not that dark and full. Now some of them do, though, and some do not. I'm on day 8 today and might try to get some pics of what I'm seeing on the eggs tonight if I can and post them here. That might be the easiest approach if I can get good pics. Some are obviously not fertilized and undeveloped, some look darker and fuller, some look slightly darker with some small, darker, round objects that I suspect would be eyes, etc.

 

[Aacre]

Thank you! Mine didn't look like that at day 3....not that dark and full. Now some of them do, though, and some do not. I'm on day 8 today and might try to get some pics of what I'm seeing on the eggs tonight if I can and post them here. That might be the easiest approach if I can get good pics. Some are obviously not fertilized and undeveloped, some look darker and fuller, some look slightly darker with some small, darker, round objects that I suspect would be eyes, etc.

Mine isn't too dark, really. It's obvious that there is a yolk in there and it's doing something. It definitely looks darker than when I first put them in the incubator. This one in particular has little floating things in it too. Brown eggs just aren't very good at letting us see in them, mostly. I find myself squinting a lot!

My little pinkish eggs are a lot more forgiving!

 

[ChocolateMouse]

*shrugs* Every LED flashlight I have looks blue or blueish to me. But my mom has an old fashioned full sized maglight she got when I was a kid for camping. The thing weighs more than my chickens and runs on like four D sized batteries. It has one little bulb in it that is not an LED and it does not seem to be brighter than any of the LED lights I have... It LOOKS darker to my eyes. But it did penetrate the shell. I was able, as a complete newbie, to identify 4/6 duds on day 14 in my nest of a dozen Maran eggs and I could clearly see movement in some of them. My LED lights, even the high lumens ones, just barely showed up the aircell. Its quite possible that all my LED lights are blue... But I don't feel the need to buy a candler when I can just borrow my moms maglight.

I also prefer yellow lights for camping because they don't kill my night vision. I prefer walking around with a large candle than anything that produces blue light.

 

[ronott1]

*shrugs* Every LED flashlight I have looks blue or blueish to me. But my mom has an old fashioned full sized maglight she got when I was a kid for camping. The thing weighs more than my chickens and runs on like four D sized batteries. It has one little bulb in it that is not an LED and it does not seem to be brighter than any of the LED lights I have... It LOOKS darker to my eyes. But it did penetrate the shell. I was able, as a complete newbie, to identify 4/6 duds on day 14 in my nest of a dozen Maran eggs and I could clearly see movement in some of them. My LED lights, even the high lumens ones, just barely showed up the aircell. Its quite possible that all my LED lights are blue... But I don't feel the need to buy a candler when I can just borrow my moms maglight.

I also prefer yellow lights for camping because they don't kill my night vision. I prefer walking around with a large candle than anything that produces blue light.

The led that is used in the Brinsea high intensity ova view is white to yellow:

Delaware egg:



Pita Pinta egg


I do not recommend using flashlights but buying a real candler. They use better LED Technology.

This is the color spectrum by Kelvin for lED bulbs:

 

[subhanalah]

What day are you on again? 7? 8? It's hard for me to keep track because I know a few people who are incubating eggs. I have found that even in the lightest brown eggs it's difficult to make much out. I've got a clutch of eggs in the incubator and they will be starting day 4 today around noon. Your's should be more advanced than what mine are (if I remember correctly). I can't help you right away, but I can share pics of them when I get there. I normally don't candle earlier than day 7 because 1. There's not much development on day 7, and 2. Sometimes, in my experience so far (not much at all), you won't see much veining until day 10-14. They seem to "explode" with veins by then! I went ahead and took one of my brown eggs out and candled it to show you what they look like at the end of day 3 (just this morning). I won't say anything or point anything out, because I want to see if you can see anything in it before I say what I see/don't see. Note: my phone camera isn't very good, so quality of pics aren't that great either. My brown egg that I candled. Same egg, candled. Note: this egg is just a little bit porous.

We're hatch buddies! My eggs start day 4 at 6 pm!

 

[Aacre]

Yippie!

It's always fun to have a hatching buddy. This will be nearly exact too! Well depending on time zones and all that.