Harbor freight is a cheap place to get wheels. You may get lucky on craigslist too. My advice is to get the largest circumference wheels that are practical. The bigger they are the easier it will roll.
I made my axle out of black iron pipe with a rod of 'all thread' inside it.
Keep thinking outside the box.
Use paper towels instead of newspaper. NP is too slick and can cause leg issues.
The dust is why I never brood in the house. Also brooding in the house would let the wife know how many birds I was adding to the place. Not good for my health.
the sand is ok for grit and a scooper works well.
Depending on the size of the container, a heat lamp may be too hot. If I just have a couple chicks and am brooding in a small container, a 75 watt drop light is enough heat.
I'm completely out of room, Every time I lose or sell a bird of another breed, I don't replace them to make more room for Penes.
I really miss White Minorcas, Anconas and Welsummers though. I'm down to one Jaer, among my favorites on the planet for a white egg layer.
I still have work to do. I have to replace the fans. I'm waiting till day 16. My incubator is integrated into the hatcher and I have to pull the incubator to get to the fans. I'll have to put the eggs in the LG temporarily as the whole process will take a couple hours. If it takes longer than that I'll turn the LG on.
For my brooder, I have to butcher about 4 roosters this week (as soon as it gets above freezing here) to make room. Some of the roosters are using the brooder house as a bachelor pad. Then I'll have to give the building a good cleaning, lay down new pine shavings, cover it with burlap, put the hover in place, put the flashing around it for a windscreen and check the electric and ceramic emitters. That should all be done by hatch day.
~~Most people use hatch in their incubator.
Most of these were answered expertly already.
They can stay in there about 48 hours. It is best to take them out when they're fluffed up but if others are pipping you really don't want to open the bator or chances are the humidity will drop too much.
The heat element is hot but in most small table top ones is only 40 watts, not likely to do much damage. Also, the power cycles so it might not even be on when the chick touches it, if they in fact did touch it.
If you have a choice, and you do, build one. A small still air will most likely be Styrofoam which is a bear to clean and properly disinfect. Hatch and dry time is when all the dirt and debris get in there. Build something with non-porous surfaces that is easy to clean. Better yet, make it so you can easily remove all the electronics for cleaning.
Same as you, opening it too much. I'm so glad my stuff is in the basement. It makes it much easier to ignore it till nature has taken its course.
If they don't pip, they won't hatch. If they pip, they may hatch. There isn't much one will or can do anyway so it's just better to wait till at least day 22 before any action is considered other than making sure the power is still on.
The first time I tried to section off eggs in the hatcher to pedigree and identify breeds, the little Houdinis got out of every container. I've now gone to zip ties on the mesh bags and made hardware cloth cages so I can leg band or toe punch them as I pull them out.
As others have said, the carton will say fertile eggs if the originating flock was free ranging with roosters. Not all TJs have them. The TJs in St. L doesn't have them and thought I was weird for asking. The Whole Foods here carries them but the originating flock is in Wisconsin. The eggs then travel to the WF distribution center in Chicago, then on to various stores in the Midwest. By the time they get to my store they are at least 10 days old. Needless to say they didn't hatch.
Some local green markets will have them too. Stores like Local Harvest.
As Ron said, call ahead. Ask the dairy manager for the Julian date on the fertile eggs carton so you'll know when they were packaged.
Congrats! I know you probably know this but that external pip is the critical time for humidity.
Does Wallyworld sell fertile eggs?
All Leghorns lay white eggs whether they be white, black, brown, buff, silver, red or whatever. Egg color is breed specific, and has nothing to do with variety/feather color.
As a general rule, breeds with white earlobes lay white eggs, breeds with red earlobes lay brown eggs. That's not entirely true however since there are exceptions to every rule.. Empordanesas and Penedesencas have white earlobes (or at least they should) yet lay among the darkest brown eggs.
There's a good discussion here. They have their own hatching club.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...cery-store-egg-hatching-club-are-you-a-member
Most hens do a great job and there are no concerns about humidity or needing electricity.
Most Mediterranean and many Continental breeds lay white eggs. Minorcas are from Spain, like the WFBS. Leghorns and Anconas are from Italy.
Minorcas, come in black(most common), buff and white(my favorite). They are probably the biggest white egg Mediterranean breed and their eggs are HUGE.
Call ahead.
Or, better yet, more coops.
Whatever breed the eggs produce will probably be based on the Leghorn but could be anything. Whatever the farmer is raising where the stores source their eggs.
If they work, it is a great deal. I just can't get fresh enough eggs around here. I still wanted to try even if I didn't have room for the birds. I'm sure I could sell them to some of the 650 people in our local chicken club.
Where are you finding all these nice used fridges?
Your call. Lots of people do but ever since I opened an egg I thought was 26 days old that had a live chick about to hatch in it. I don't toss anything that doesn't weep or stink.
Chicks love it too. Works very well and does its job.
What they don't know is that I want this to turn into a small little business. The feed is cheap here and everyone seems to want fresh farm eggs. A 50lb sack of layer feed is just $9.25. I get my grit from the river down the road. We only buy 100lbs of feed a month so $18.50 for the feed. We get 11 eggs a day so around 28 dozen eggs a month and $2.00 a dozen. So $56.00 for sold eggs minus the $18.50 for the feed. We profit around $37.00 a month from them, and I still don't have enough eggs to supply our customers. One of our customers has an at home bakery and she uses our eggs in her bakery. She prefers ours over the store bought farm eggs. Then I was thinking of selling hatching eggs on a local buy sell trade website for $6.00 a dozen. Yeah I work hard to keep the chickens up but what else am I going to do in my spare time hehe. I think of it more as a hobby.[/COLOR]
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