7th Annual BYC New Year's Day 2016 Hatch-A-Long

[Pensmaster]

Don't worry, I'll tell them not to tell anyone

Thanks I'll sleep better tonight. Everyone knows we can trust a pigeon.

 

[Lozuufy]

Of course, they are very trustworthy... most of the time

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Last year I read about using a vitamin C dip for the eggs prior to going into the incubator. I didn't have an vitamin C tablets I could crush up so I substituted apple cider vinegar instead. I even added a splash (teaspoon approx.) of it in the water for the humidity. For the first time I didn't get nasty green goo eggs. I had some that never developed but they didn't become green and gooey. I also found that by rubbing a dark brown egg with a qtip with the vinegar that I could create a "viewing window" by washing off some of the brown. They were much easier to candle then. I had a much better hatch than before using the vinegar.

I read the research and have been testing it. All the ascorbic acid I could find locally had additives like sugar in it so I ordered some on line. It is pure ascorbic acid powder from www.msm-msm.com
So far I haven't had noticeably better results with it. However, I've had incubator problems with poor hatches. If one doesn't have reliable hatch rates, testing something like AA is anecdotal at best and a bust at worst.
When I get my cabinet and hatcher rebuilt, I'll try again. I'm not setting any more eggs till then.

I thought it would be fun to show 2 of my Christmas gifts I got this year that has to do with chickens

Nice gifts
Love the chart. Wife would like the art glass bird.

My Christmas gifts from daughter-in-law to be:

She did well!

Cute

...
It's amazing how having the bator calibrated and at the right temperature changes things...duh!

Oh how true.

On another thread, someone said that the governor declared Missouri in a state of emergency.

I think that happened yesterday after 11 people drowned and over 180 roads closed including both east and west bound lanes of Interstate 70. West bound lanes opened after about 18 hours but east bound will still be closed till this evening. Where the closure is, most of the alternate routes are closed as well.
4 of the people that died were international soldiers from other countries stationed in Fort Leonard Wood that were swept off a road.

Locally, this is the wettest year on record, the wettest December on record (another 2 or 3 inches are coming today) and Saturday was the 3rd wettest single day in history.
My rain gauge had a crack at the 2" mark. I couldn't understand why it always read 2" when I went to empty it. And the standing water indicated we had more rain than that.
I just put a new one out. Local news said we had 9" so far with this storm and it will rain hard into the evening.

That house was close to the pea river.
Our flooding was from a chain of ponds bursting.

Quote:

Every idiot with a tractor builds a pond in my neck of the woods

There was a reservoir operated by the electric company Ameren on MO's highest peak (Taum Sauk Mountain). It had an earthen dam that breached and the entire reservoir came down at once. It swept people down valley out of their beds in the night -some infants and children. A child was found pinned under a tree. As far as I know, miraculously there were no fatalities from the 10-20 foot wall of water that came down the mountain and ravaged Johnson Shut-ins state park. It took years to clean up. There are room size boulders strewn across what was an empty field along the middle fork of the Black river. There was fear that the dam on Clearwater lake would fail when the 5 million tons of water hit the lake. That would have deluged homes along the river downstream.
A water level sensor failed and water was continuously pumped into the reservoir which overtopped the dam, eroding it till it failed.
http://www.semissourian.com/story/1131499.html
An Ozark mountain song with pictures.

Ameren then raised their electric rates to pay for the cleanup and reimbursement.

Thanks guys for all the kind words and well wishes. You have encouraged me through a rough patch. I love my chicken buddies.

It's terrible. I had a tough time when the mink killed 6 flocks of my chickens in 6 nights. It took me a week to burn all the carcasses.

Accuweather kept saying rain in so many minutes. I saw one that said rain in 3 minutes and then it said rain in 72 minutes.

The ground is wet this morning so some moisture came through in the night. No snow though. It did snow in Redding yesterday. The are at about 500fr in elevation though.

I'll trade you some wet ground for some extremely, epically, soggy soil with inches of standing water.

I have one already in the brooder from my last hatch. He's 3 weeks old so I'm hoping they will go well together. My last hatch which was my first only 1 made it out of 7 eggs. Not to sure what's going on and what is happening for them all to be quitters. Hopefully after this things start turning around or I won't do it again.

Don't overlook any possibilities.
http://extension.illinois.edu/eggs/res24-00.html
http://ufdc.ufl.edu/UF00008570/00001/1j

 

[silly4buttons]

We are supposed to get it bad in TN again tomorrow. I hope AL. is spared this time. You guys have definitely had enough. I've got that isabelle leghorn rooster for you whenever you dry out and rebuild. Already told him he was going to the great state of Alabama!

thats so amazing the people on here are thoughtful and willing to lend a hand when needed. It's just amazing to me.

 

[manicfarmer]

Sorry but it got too daunting to keep up with all the reading so I dropped out. I was one of the earlier setters. This was my first time hatching. I ordered 6 Heritage RIR and they sent 9. I put 12 of my own eggs in the bator along with those 9 making for a total of 21 eggs. After week two I discarded a yoker (one of my own) and one of the RIR had a blood ring so that bid didn't make it leaving 19. I couldn't see much development in most of these eggs because of how dark so I was going off the air sac. I set them on 12/5 at 6PM making 12/26 at 6PM day 21. The remaining 11 that I contributed all hatched early on 12/25. I saw one pip the morning of 12/26 of a RIR shell. The RIR took so much longer to hatch. I thought I was only getting 3 and they just kept pipping. I pulled two of the RIR out yesterday and put in the brooder and this morning I pulled 3 more out to put in the brooder. I discarded one eggs last night because I am pretty sure he didn't make it and left two eggs in the bator. Last night I noticed another had pipped at the end of day 22 (lol). He hasn't made much progress but I am sure he is working diligently to get out of that shell. I just thought the timing of hatching fresh local eggs versus shipped eggs is very interesting. I suspect it will take him the duration of the day to hatch probably pushing him into 24 days in the incubator. Out of 21 eggs, 17 hatched. Not bad for a newbie. The Dark Cornish/White Rock Crosses are the cutest. There are 6 of those. 5 Red Ranger/White Rock Crosses and 6 RIR. Well, one of the RIR hasn't finished hatching yet but I have faith he will make it. The little beak is sticking out of the hole he pipped and he is clearly working on getting out.

 

[S5apiotrowski]

Only 2 out of 22 are making it to lockdown. Will be a nail bitting next few days!

Praying that both your chicks make it... I'd be looking for a couple more too. My last hatch we got 5 of 25 with one that died after pipping and we lost another after the hatch (so 4 left). 4 is a great number - good socialization and not too crowded. A single lonely chick (or chicken) is never a good thing.

 

[canadachickens]

Just an update. Candled this morning. One quitter, two maybes, but gonna leave them for the duration if they don't smell or ooze, and four remaining viable. Pretty miserable about the whole thing right now.

 

[venymae]

The storm last night mostly missed us. Some light snow and lots of cold cold cold wind today! Eggies are at a friends House still. Dads chickens are probably little popsicles, poor things! He has the coop so the big screen window faces north and the cold snow and wind just blow right into the coop. It has a broken wheel which is why it hasn't been moved. I found some scrap wood and tried to lean it against the window to break the wind, so hopefully that helps. It is wicked cold!

 

[venymae]

The Brinsea is being difficult and not turning some of the eggs again -_- I told the people eggsitting to just keep adjusting them till they turn, but it's really frustrating! You'd think for the $$$ it would do better :/

 

[SenuaGifts]

Bamadude, we are neighbors..Ariton..if I can do anything to help let me know.