A Bielefelder Thread !

[bluejean55girl]

Quote:
how is schnute today?

 

[bluejean55girl]

Possibly. If you band them somehow, maybe you should track how they feather out to see if there's a correlation. Plus, if you're planning to breed these guys, it might be beneficial to stick to those with the best sex-link characteristics.


EDIT: I just looked through the photos of my Biels. That one cockerel, Brom, that had the less clearly defined coloring did in fact feather out darker as he approached adulthood. Unfortunately I butchered him at 20 weeks so there's no telling how he would have eventually feathered out.

I finally found some small rubber bands and banded 4 males, two with the best brown back stripes and head spots on left foot, and the two biggest males with more grey on their wings on their right foot.

and the last hatched female, that I peeled out of the shell, chip by chip.. she is two days behind the other girls and is still smaller sized. seems to be doing okay so far, thanks the info on this site, I waited until the blood vessels were gone in the membrane, she had a noticeable egg sack belly, so I let her stay in incubator alone until she looked like the other chicks. she is doing well so far.

yesterday at 4 days several of the group spent a lot of time on top of the heating pad. blooie's system is so nice! our house maintains a steady 72 degrees, but spring time with the temp swings outside, I have to switch it back and forth from heating to a/c. so it got up to 75 last night before bedtime and had to switch the a/c to cool the house down for hubby's sleeping. then this am, house was 68 degrees, so had to switch it back to heat.

chicks are fine, little eating/pooping machines!

 

[bluejean55girl]

Gender is determined at the point of fertilization, just as with humans. Nothing you do during incubation can change that.

Maybe it's the photo quality, but I don't see huge color variability in your cockerels. To my eye it's pretty obvious which are males and which are females. In my own hatch I did have one chick that was practically solid in color and for the longest time I wasn't precisely certain of gender. It turned out to be male, and was probably the least favorable of my cockerels...very nervous and flighty compared to the others, and rather skinny by comparison as well. He was an easy cull selection.

interesting link

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/a-drop-in-temperature-can-change-the-sex-of-chickens-1238516.html

 

[Bine]

Quote: I think his beak is still a little sensitive, so he had old white bread in milk today. He get still chased during "playtime" on the allotment, but not that bad and he gets along with Milo in the chicken run. So far so good.

 

[DesertChic]

interesting link

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/a-drop-in-temperature-can-change-the-sex-of-chickens-1238516.html

Interesting, but I'm still not sure I'm buying it. I can't test the theory with this hatch because today is day 18 (YAY! Lockdown day!), but I may test this theory in the future, just for the fun of it. I seem to have tremendous luck hatching mostly males and if there were actually a way to control the hatches it would be extremely helpful. I could hatch mostly males when I want to caponize, and mostly females when I want to sell chicks or replenish my own stock.

 

[bluejean55girl]

Interesting, but I'm still not sure I'm buying it. I can't test the theory with this hatch because today is day 18 (YAY! Lockdown day!), but I may test this theory in the future, just for the fun of it. I seem to have tremendous luck hatching mostly males and if there were actually a way to control the hatches it would be extremely helpful. I could hatch mostly males when I want to caponize, and mostly females when I want to sell chicks or replenish my own stock. 

yep, it's an older article, you would think so more people would have played with it. It seems like you would have to set extra eggs to make up for the losses. Day 4 is sex determination day if I understand correctly.

 

[otakalhasas]

yep, it's an older article, you would think so more people would have played with it. It seems like you would have to set extra eggs to make up for the losses. Day 4 is sex determination day if I understand correctly.

Okay, my inexperience is rearing its very little head! I thought all incubating eggs needed to be kept at 99.6 to 99.9. If one sets the incubator at 86 F (30 degrees C), won't the embryos die? Or do you just drop the temp for a couple of hours on day 4?

AAAARRRRGGGGG - I'm confused!

 

[bluejean55girl]

Okay, my inexperience is rearing its very little head!  I thought all incubating eggs needed to be kept at 99.6 to 99.9.  If one sets the incubator at 86 F (30 degrees C), won't the embryos die?  Or do you just drop the temp for a couple of hours on day 4?

AAAARRRRGGGGG - I'm confused!

sorry to cause any confusion. Just stick with the constant temperature settings. This would be for someone that is already experienced with hatching and how their own particular incubator works. I'm nowhere near that. I just ran across this old article to share. I'm a research junkie.

 

[otakalhasas]

Thanks! Will do, but quite frankly once I get more experience with this incubator stuff, it certainly would be interesting to experiment with a few hatches!

 

[DesertChic]

Okay, my inexperience is rearing its very little head! I thought all incubating eggs needed to be kept at 99.6 to 99.9. If one sets the incubator at 86 F (30 degrees C), won't the embryos die? Or do you just drop the temp for a couple of hours on day 4?

AAAARRRRGGGGG - I'm confused!

It's my understanding that embryonic development actually begins once the eggs have been consistently held at 85ºF or higher for 24 hours, so a lower temp should still stimulate development, though perhaps with a higher rate of stalling or fizzling out. Like I said, I may just try this for the sake of curiosity.