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

[Beekissed]

C'mon, Bee... I'm dying over here... Show us some photos of your chickies !!

just lurking ,patiently waiting for news on the last chick,
guessing pics will have to wait til tomorrow

Yep...waiting until they all come out. Only two are white chicks and the rest are pretty much carbon copies of Hootie, so taking pics of each chick is kinda like showing you one chick over and over.

That last chick is a Hootie too and he's taking a rest. But he's got a pea sized hole carved out....these FF shells are tough! Especially the smaller BA shells..slick and thick, they are.

I'll do a group pic tomorrow of the whole gang and do a video of the brooder community in which they live...it's hilarious. Those little ducks are just precious and the RIR chicks are like a group of circus clowns with the injured meaty chick being the elephant in the circus.

It's almost over, folks...can you believe it? I'll finally have a room that doesn't have feathers blowing all over it~that was a dumb idea, BTW~ no pieces of hay on the carpeting and the only chair in my room will no longer have a cardboard box full of eggs sitting in it.

My bedroom stays messy all the time and it's not even normal mess...it's either FF buckets slopping onto trash bags laid down under the bucket for just that reason, or it's feathers, hay and flashlights everywhere around the box in my rocking chair. It will be good to have my rocking chair back..it's where I throw all my clothes when I take them off each evening.

 

[RachaelS]

Okay so there is anecdotal evidence, when incubating, that if your temps run hotter than normal then only the male chicks survive. If your temps run cooler, then only the females survive. I have "heard" this several times.

My own experience say that the male part is true, 3 hatches only got one out of each and all three were males. Anyway besides the point.

Anyone else heard this? If it is true, any idea why? My thought is that maybe hot temps mean there are more broodies sitting on the nest and the need for more roosters. Then the cooler temps could be the loss of a broody or her needing to get up more often to find food and water, and the need for the females to survive.

Just a random thought that passed through my head, nothing more

 

[RachaelS]

In Stromberg's Guide to Better Hatching, there's a description of a method where they use the heat of the eggs themselves to hatch the entire batch. It involved having a fairly large group of eggs. I can't put my hand to the book right at the moment? Maybe someone else can? But apparently, once they get going the eggs themselves have a certain amount of body heat. Makes sense, really.

Wow, that would be great information.

 

[Cowpoke]

Patiently

waiting on the caboose, pics and detailed summary. Love that you and you're method is "NATURAL" as you can Bee!

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

 

[RachaelS]

Patiently

waiting on the caboose, pics and detailed summary. Love that you and you're method is "NATURAL" as you can Bee!

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Bee you have got to name her that "Caboose"!!!!

 

[Beekissed]

It's late...it has GOT to be a female!

I expect this one is "Don'tgivea Hoot"....named earlier by BCMaraniac.

 

[Tumbleweed Farm]

Great name--I just love the little Hooties!

 

[RachaelS]

It's late...it has GOT to be a female!

I expect this one is "Don'tgivea Hoot"....named earlier by BCMaraniac.

That is a good one

 

[Lacy Blues]

Well these guys died last night within an hour of each other--about 8 hrs after hatch. They were pathetic,weak, deformed feet and neither could walk. They were as floppy as a dishrag and ould barely hold their heads up. The weirdest part was they had no normal chick fuzz, just a dog like oarse short hair. I'm ok with the loss.

I had 7 Plymouth Rocks hatch, 100% that made it to lockdown. They were in their own incubator (hacthed out 100% Delawares--all A OK in another incubator). Temps and humidity same for both bators. Here is how the 7 hatchlings went down:

1-3, no issues, quick zip, robust chicks
4-5, quick zip, weird down, weak, died 8 hrs later.
6, quick zip, normal down, robust
7, long, horrible zip (12 hrs) constant distress chirping in egg, feet sticking out free and clear in with eggshell gone,, head stuck in top half of eggshell, hatched with unabsorbed yolk. Weak, listless. I may cull it later.

This was my hatch from H---LL! Makes me want to stop hathing, but Im almost done. I will only use Broodys when this is over!

The description of your chicks sounds like "clubbed down?"

Here is Gail Damerow's description: An embryo's appearance, combined with the day on which it died, provides a clue regarding which nutrient might be lacking For example, in riboflavin deficiency, deaths peak at three points: the fourth, tenth and fourteenth days of incubation. Embryos may be dwarfed, have beaks that look like a parrot's , have unusually short wings and legs, and have clubbed down - a condition, seen most often in black breeds, in which the down is clumpy, and curls in a characteristic way because the down sheaths fail to rupture.

Or, if a chick dies soon after hatching, it could be a vitamin e deficiency.

There are some other things that would be lengthy to type out so if you'd like to know, just let me know.

One thing is for sure, you said these birds were from Scott? Being a breeder, I can tell you I would want to know this kind of thing and it's just my opinion, but I think you need to tell Scott about it.

 

[Tumbleweed Farm]

Quote: Yes, I will contact him. I did not want to name names and sound accusatory, wish I had not mentioned him by name, I adore his Columbian Rocks and was just sick to have this happen. I, too, would want to know if they were mine. He's a great guy, and a respected breeder. I suppose it could have been from faulty incubation but I don't think so, Ive hatched 100s of chicks without incident. I have 6 Brinsea's that are spot on. Do you think it could have been humidity, temps were 99.5 for the entire hatch (except for the hourly daily cooldown)? You know, I think diagnosing what went wrong is usually a futile exercise. The hair on the dead ones though really bug me, I've never seen anything like it before. They were like straight, longish terrier dog type fuzz.

Lacy, thanks so very much.