6th Annual BYC New Year's Day 2015 Hatch-A-Long

[Dish chickens]

Those sound beautiful! Best of luck.
I need more room!! Every time I read about others' chicks/birds.. I'm telling myself "no,no more birds". Sigh love my birds..and ducks...and dogs...and goats...
Jeez, what's a few more chickens??

Pen one rooster

Pen two rooster









Just a few more won't hurt----

The blues above are the breeding pen the HAL eggs are all from. Blue on Blue

 

[Kaylish]

I cant wait to get some orps

I have 2 hatchery Buffs (my first chickens) And now I'm hatching heritage Reds. I can't wait to see the difference in size and personality.

I'm not doing well for this HAL. Of my 24 eggs set I just pulled 15 clears and one blood ring. Eggtopsy showed I was right on the clears and the blood ring one had a start but stopped before veining. Of the 8 left 2 are perfect at this point. The other 6 have mass but hard to see into. Keeping my fingers crossed. Should I add a water bottle or two to help stabilize the temps with so little eggs in there?

Sorry to hear, I would think a water bottle couldn't hurt as long as it doesn't block airflow. the rest grow well!

 

[FuzzyHens]

I cut down egg cartons from the top, fill the water channels and get humidity up to 65%. If the humidity is too low I will and a glass storage dish with a clean kitchen sponge.

I usually wait until day 19. I candle the eggs and look for the side with the biggest part of the air cell and tilt the eggs in the carton so that it is up. The chick usually pips in the middle top third of the air cell. Mark that spot with an X to see how close the chick got to that spot.

I hope this makes sense!

Quick question on positioning with regard to the air cell...when I candled at day 7, one of my eggs had the air cell on the side of the egg. At lock down should I position that egg on it's side with the air cell up? I know this is not ideal, but I'd like to give the chick the best chance possible.

 

[Kaylish]

I will putting up some hardware cloth to enclose the broody nest box area so I will put some chick feed and a water bottle in with the two broody girls. If I can get it in the box with them, hmm...I will have to figure that one out. Thanks! Good luck to you too!

I used the quart-size chick feeder & waters within reach of the nest for my broody (something I already had). I put marbles in the waterer until all the chicks were running around. I've also heard that the wide bottom cat dishes work well.

Pen one rooster Pen two rooster Just a few more won't hurt---- The blues above are the breeding pen the HAL eggs are all from. Blue on Blue

OMG Beautiful!

 

[Aliciahess]

@Dish chickens...
Beautiful just beautiful! Sell eggs?
Will just make more room... lol

I'm having a hard time candling because the eggs are so dark. I have them propped up at a 45 degree angle fat end up,they smell fine still. Do I just keep smelling cross my fingers and wait?
Haven't tried a lot,didn't want to disturb them anymore than necessary. Was pretty clear(or too dark) first time I candled I couldn't see much.

 

[ronott1]

Quick question on positioning with regard to the air cell...when I candled at day 7, one of my eggs had the air cell on the side of the egg. At lock down should I position that egg on it's side with the air cell up? I know this is not ideal, but I'd like to give the chick the best chance possible.

The egg should be tilted so that the air cell is up.

It sounds like a detached air cell--those will have a low hatch rate and you may need to help. For that one, draw an outline of the air cell at hatch.

Go read the diary of a detached air cell thread too.

 

[blackgoat]

I had an accidental cool down tonight. I knocked the wires loose from the thermostat while I was cleaning around the incubator but I though they were back in. I just put 16 more Serama eggs in today! I am just going to pretend it's Spring...

My incubators got accent end tally(<--really,auto-correct?) unplugged at some time last night. The dome incubator got down to room temp (66) and the foam incubator was at 76 when I discovered they were unplugged.

I have no idea how long they were "cooling", it could have been as long as 8 hours, but maybe that will make up for all the times the temp spiked to 103. lol! I hope they are okay

I should have at least 10 more eggs arriving tomorrow ( I don't know why these ones coming from LA are taking as long as the ones sent from CA). This is me being restrained! I don't know what will happen for the Easter HAL!

 

[chickkrakidd]

Those sound beautiful! Best of luck.
I need more room!! Every time I read about others' chicks/birds.. I'm telling myself "no,no more birds". Sigh love my birds..and ducks...and dogs...and goats...
Jeez, what's a few more chickens??

Wish I had a dog... and some goats... and some ducks. Hopefully I'll be getting some hatching duck eggs to hatch from my neighbor

I have 2 hatchery Buffs (my first chickens) And now I'm hatching heritage Reds. I can't wait to see the difference in size and personality.
Sorry to hear, I would think a water bottle couldn't hurt as long as it doesn't block airflow. the rest grow well!

Where did u find the red orps??

 

[ronott1]

My incubators got accent end tally(<--really,auto-correct?) unplugged at some time last night. The dome incubator got down to room temp (66) and the foam incubator was at 76 when I discovered they were unplugged.

I have no idea how long they were "cooling", it could have been as long as 8 hours, but maybe that will make up for all the times the temp spiked to 103. lol! I hope they are okay

I should have at least 10 more eggs arriving tomorrow ( I don't know why these ones coming from LA are taking as long as the ones sent from CA). This is me being restrained! I don't know what will happen for the Easter HAL!

Candle them tomorrow--They should be fine.

 

[blackgoat]

I cut down egg cartons from the top, fill the water channels and get humidity up to 65%. If the humidity is too low I will and a glass storage dish with a clean kitchen sponge.

I usually wait until day 19. I candle the eggs and look for the side with the biggest part of the air cell and tilt the eggs in the carton so that it is up. The chick usually pips in the middle top third of the air cell. Mark that spot with an X to see how close the chick got to that spot.

I hope this makes sense!

Do you have to be careful which kind of sponges you use? Don't most kitchen sponges have anti-bacterial agents in them? I know you are not supposed to use them to clean aquariums.
I have a question about saddle-shaped air cells. I have my eggs laying down in the incubator, should I put the saddle-cell ones in a carton now?