5th Annual BYC New Year's Day 2014 Hatch-A-Long

[CackleJoy]

I think it's time for you to relax. Sounds like everything is working perfectly for you.

If you can keep the humidity and temp correct, then the more ventilation the better.


Someone gave me a good tip. Get a cheap but powerful LED flashlight with multiple lamps. Take the lens out and the egg sets lower, it works like a champ.


My wife is always asking me where her stuff is cause she assumes it's outside. I was using her colander to sprout grains and seeds. I bought a plastic one but the holes were too big to hold wheat and flax. So I traded her for the wire mesh one. She likes the plastic one better for pasta.
Win - win.

I sit the hygrometer outside. an hour later I go to Accuweather, punch in my zip code and see what they're reporting for the humidity and compare.
That's close enough for government work.

See above about removing the lens on an LED flashlight. Just buy the size that works.


Ready for another good story about Penes?
I had an old LG someone gave me. The Styrofoam was corroded so wouldn't seal well. The windows were missing. I just bought a couple small pieces of glass and glued them on. I repaired the mating edges with some water putty.
When my first Penedesencas started laying, I set 30 eggs once the pullets started laying good size eggs. No matter what I did the temperature wouldn't stabilize. It kept swinging from 82 to 108. After about 5 days I gave up figuring they cooked. I had a couple hens go broody so I put fresh eggs under them.
I got busy and completely brain farted on the incubator. A couple weeks later I went into the basement to get some feed and I heard some noise.
I kept rustling around and the noise didn't stop. I thought "those mice sure are brave making so much noise with me down here".
I went to investigate and

there were 2 chicks running around the incubator. It was day 22. Wild temperature swings and eggs not turned after day 5 and they hatched anyway.
I thought these are super birds. It was one cockerel and one pullet. I leg banded them so I could tell them from those that hatched under the broodies.
Wouldn't you know it, they lost their leg bands.
I was thinking I could develop a super race of chickens that would hatch no matter how bad I screwed up incubation.

This was the batch of eggs.






I never brood chicks in the house. I always say that the dust wouldn't have a chance to kill me, my wife would have already done so.
I have to get my automatic doors finished.
She's pretty upset about having to get home by dusk every day to lock up.


maybe these will help

http://www.natureform.com/kb/newArticles/12.html

http://www.natureform.com/kb/newArticles/4.html

http://www.natureform.com/kb/newArticles/8.html

http://www.brinsea.com/pdffiles/what is egg candling.pdf

http://www.brinsea.com/customerservice/poweroff.html

http://www.brinsea.com/customerservice/storage.html

http://www.brinsea.com/customerservice/preseason.html


Quote:

I have 7 different groups of chickens. It wasn't so bad till the weather got real cold and I had to shut down the automatic water systems.
I'm also feeding fermented feed which takes longer.
If I hustle, I can still get done in well under an hour.

I think it's time for you to relax. Sounds like everything is working perfectly for you.

If you can keep the humidity and temp correct, then the more ventilation the better.


Someone gave me a good tip. Get a cheap but powerful LED flashlight with multiple lamps. Take the lens out and the egg sets lower, it works like a champ.


My wife is always asking me where her stuff is cause she assumes it's outside. I was using her colander to sprout grains and seeds. I bought a plastic one but the holes were too big to hold wheat and flax. So I traded her for the wire mesh one. She likes the plastic one better for pasta.
Win - win.

I sit the hygrometer outside. an hour later I go to Accuweather, punch in my zip code and see what they're reporting for the humidity and compare.
That's close enough for government work.

See above about removing the lens on an LED flashlight. Just buy the size that works.


Ready for another good story about Penes?
I had an old LG someone gave me. The Styrofoam was corroded so wouldn't seal well. The windows were missing. I just bought a couple small pieces of glass and glued them on. I repaired the mating edges with some water putty.
When my first Penedesencas started laying, I set 30 eggs once the pullets started laying good size eggs. No matter what I did the temperature wouldn't stabilize. It kept swinging from 82 to 108. After about 5 days I gave up figuring they cooked. I had a couple hens go broody so I put fresh eggs under them.
I got busy and completely brain farted on the incubator. A couple weeks later I went into the basement to get some feed and I heard some noise.
I kept rustling around and the noise didn't stop. I thought "those mice sure are brave making so much noise with me down here".
I went to investigate and

there were 2 chicks running around the incubator. It was day 22. Wild temperature swings and eggs not turned after day 5 and they hatched anyway.
I thought these are super birds. It was one cockerel and one pullet. I leg banded them so I could tell them from those that hatched under the broodies.
Wouldn't you know it, they lost their leg bands.
I was thinking I could develop a super race of chickens that would hatch no matter how bad I screwed up incubation.

This was the batch of eggs.






I never brood chicks in the house. I always say that the dust wouldn't have a chance to kill me, my wife would have already done so.
I have to get my automatic doors finished.
She's pretty upset about having to get home by dusk every day to lock up.


maybe these will help

http://www.natureform.com/kb/newArticles/12.html

http://www.natureform.com/kb/newArticles/4.html

http://www.natureform.com/kb/newArticles/8.html

http://www.brinsea.com/pdffiles/what is egg candling.pdf

http://www.brinsea.com/customerservice/poweroff.html

http://www.brinsea.com/customerservice/storage.html

http://www.brinsea.com/customerservice/preseason.html


Quote:

I have 7 different groups of chickens. It wasn't so bad till the weather got real cold and I had to shut down the automatic water systems.
I'm also feeding fermented feed which takes longer.
If I hustle, I can still get done in well under an hour.

THANK YOU!

 

[CackleJoy]

WoW - a double quote!

 

[ChickenCanoe]

chickengirl1193, brooders can be as simple as you want - even a cardboard box, although my preference is larger plastic storage containers (washable and easy to disinfect). I line the bottom with newspaper, then a layer of shavings, then cover with paper towels (the papr towel is removed after the first few days). Before I put in shavings I put in a couple pieces of 2x4 or a half patio block for the waterer to sit on so it is less likely to tip over. Heat lamp suspended/clamped over one end. Put a thermometer under it and turn it on. Should not take more than an hour to come to temp, more like 15 minutes - should be ~95 degrees right under it. Warmer - move the lamp higher, cooler, move it lower. As long as the heat is at one end the chicks can get away from it as they need to. I put food and water about midway between warm and cool ends. Sprinkle some starter crumble on the paper towels so the chicks spot it and pick it up.



I would start looking for starter now, I always buy a 50 lb bag because I have given in to the reality that I will hatch year round. I prefer a locally ground starter, and they only grind once a year, so once they're out I have to use one of the commercial brands (Purina, Nutrena, etc.).



I pull the paper towel up once I know they are eating from the feeder. It's handy to have two brooders so you can just move the chicks from the dirty one to the clean one when necessary. When you are ready to clean, you roll the whole mess (minus chicks and whatever the waterer is sitting on) up inside the newspaper like a burrito and put in the trash bag.

Some good advice.
We all have our methods and it's hard to screw up unless we cook them.
I rarely use a small container for brooding, though I do have a couple huge Rubbermaid tubs if I'm only brooding 1-5 chicks. As long as the room isn't super cold a heat lamp isn't necessary in such a small space. The first time I used a tub I'm so glad I put a thermometer under the heat lamp before I put the chicks in. It exploded. I had a friend house/chicken/dog sitting for a couple days. He cooked the chicks by having the lamp too close. From that point on I just use a 75 watt bulb in a drop light and that's sufficient. You can cover part of the tub with a piece of cardboard or board to hold some heat in.

If you are using a small container, they do sell ceramic infrared heat emitters in various wattages from 75-250. I use them almost exclusively now for brooding. They aren't as prone to breaking and if they do they don't leave bits of glass all over.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trk...&_nkw=ceramic+heat+emitter&_sacat=0&_from=R40

I also do the burrito thing but I only use paper towels. Even if I use a tub, they aren't in there any more than a week or so. I get a cheap roll when I start chicks and put down a double layer. Every day I roll it up and put it in the compost pile.

Another good point you made was to keep them on paper towels until they know what food is. A broody will show the chicks what to eat.
Without a mom, chicks will eat whatever is at their feet. If that's shavings they may choose to eat some. I put burlap over the shavings and paper towels over that. Sprinkle the feed and hardboiled egg yolk on the paper towels when I stick them in the brooder space the first day, then they find the feed in the feeders.

I would look for a good starter now too, it will get you away from the incubator. I wouldn't buy it yet though. Whole grains hold their nutrients well but once ground, as in chicken feed, it loses it's nutrients and palatability a lot faster.
The TSC about a half hour from me heavily discounts their feed when it's about 3 months old. I imagine it is a corporate policy.
The feed store right up the street doesn't have a ton of chicken customers and most are buying layer. The last time I checked, their start and grow was 4 months old. I wouldn't buy it. They had packages of vitamins/electrolytes that had expired 3 years earlier. I told them about it. The packs are still there today.
Always read labels, not only for feed ingredients, protein and calcium percentages, sources of protein, but also for the packaging date or expiration date.
Most of my feed comes from a friend that wholesales and I've never gotten a bag from her that was over a month since bagged.
In the commercial poultry business; layers, broilers, turkeys etc., the feed they get is only a day old. I used to program mills for some of the largest poultry producers. It was really high pressure because they (like the auto industry) did the 'just in time' supply system. However it's more important with poultry because the feed has a shelf life. An axle lasts a long time on the shelf. In the auto industry they just wanted to eliminate the inventory cost.
We always had an expression when a line in the mill went down. "We're starving chickens".
The mills are only idle a few hours on Sunday night. They are a steady line of feed trucks almost 24 hours a day making deliveries to the farms.

My preference for brooding is a large space with one or two(depending on season) hot spots and lots of cool space. It is so much easier than stressing over the temperature of the brooder. This is the way a broody raises the chicks and is much healthier. She provides a warm place and lots of cool space. She doesn't warm all the ambient air.

 

[CackleJoy]

I am going to stop tonight on the way home to pick up those local fertile eggs. I am arguing with myself about whether to dip them in bleach solution or Oxine solution before adding them to an incubator, and also trying to decide whether to move some previously set eggs to the Brinsea I set the NYDH eggs in and put the local eggs into a styro by themselves. Decisions, decisions.

This question is only because I am so new - I thought we wern't supposed to wash the eggs? I'm the one who wears medical gloves even during gathering to keep hand oils off. I also put a smutty one in the bator because it was so big. I've been worrying ever since that it will contaminate the whole lot. Even considered pulling it. If bleach dunking is okay, I would have done it with that one egg.

 

[itsbob]

Quote:
I've never seen a mama chicken with a bottle of bleach..

 

[ronott1]

This question is only because I am so new - I thought we wern't supposed to wash the eggs? I'm the one who wears medical gloves even during gathering to keep hand oils off. I also put a smutty one in the bator because it was so big. I've been worrying ever since that it will contaminate the whole lot. Even considered pulling it. If bleach dunking is okay, I would have done it with that one egg.

I do not wash the eggs. I will use a paper towel to remove big bits of "dirt".

If eggs break in shipping and the egg goo gets on eggs that did not break, I would wash them then. The hatch rate will already be low because of the rough handling any way so cleaning them will not hurt. I really hate it when eggs go rotten in the incubator....

 

[KimberlyK0509]

I can't seem to figure out how to get my picture uploaded but Dec 10th at 9:20 pm i set 7 eggs. 2 SFH 3 tolbunt polish and 2 jubilees Orpingtons. will continue to try and load pic.

 

[Pozees]

Well, dipping in water that's ~110 degrees with a capful of bleach or Oxine added is recommended by some just in case of contaminants - like for no more than 3-4 seconds - then letting dry on a clean towel, then set. Rubbing is a no-no, you will remove bloom. I woudl say if you are only incubating your own eggs dipping probably isn't necessary, but when combining eggs from multiple sources, maybe it is? Don't know, I tend to worry about lots of things that probably don't need to be worried about.

That article from Egypt discusses dipping in Ascorbic Acid solution prior to setting, which I think is so fascinating, and along with the day 16 cooling I am tempted to try it. I have often wondered about removing the lid from the incubator for a few minutes every day just like a setting hen would do when getting up to relieve herself, eat, and drink.

ChickenCanoe, absolutely great ideas about brooding, the minute I have a little more space available (hopefully in the next few months) I am setting aside floor space for brooding that way. Speaking of which, it looked to me like you have a homemade hover brooder in one of your brooding areas, which I think you even briefly discussed earlier. Can you tell us more about how you made it?

 

[CackleJoy]

Quote:


I've never seen a mama chicken with a bottle of bleach..

okay

that put things in perspective for me. I'll quit worrying - about that one egg anyway

 

[CackleJoy]

I do not wash the eggs. I will use a paper towel to remove big bits of "dirt".

If eggs break in shipping and the egg goo gets on eggs that did not break, I would wash them then. The hatch rate will already be low because of the rough handling any way so cleaning them will not hurt. I really hate it when eggs go rotten in the incubator....