a little story of my first broody hen experience (pics)

[3acres]

Okay I couldn't handle it anymore. Since I have been hatching in an incubator for a year and a half now I decided to candle the eggs, I figured it had been 4 days I should be able to see something. Well I set her with 12 eggs in a cage well she broke one trying to move them into her own spot I guess but left the egg alone after she broke it. I am very glad to say she still has 11 eggs and so far I can see all 11 embryos moving. I told my husband that we were going to be grandparents since it is my 8 and a half year old sons chicken that is setting and he laughed at me. But that is to be expected since he didn't want anything to do with chickens and ducks until a month ago when I hatch a duck out and I was planning on raising it for eating purposes until he named it Daffy and made it his pet duck, and he thought I was bad with my very first duck I hatched out and named it oreo. He watches tv with his. I figure he will get more into this hatch closer to Valentines since they are due on Valentines day.

i also ordered chicks and got them on the 17th of this months but we got 1 out of 4 ducks alive and 1 chick out of 6 that we ordered but it was the wrong color, my daughter picked out a Blue Millie Fluer D'uclle and these are yellow bodies and orange heads the wings are orange now that the feathers are in, and we got like 2 or 3 of the chicks they put in extra just for heat. I called and they are going to try again, they are shipping again in about a week to two weeks. YAY I am excited and so is my 6 year old daughter she will finally have chickens that are her size that she can collect eggs from.

I will keep you posted and post pictures. Also I built my incubator with stuff I had laying around my yard and garage. It is an old bathroom sink cabinet that I put a board on top and on back and put shelfs in and a small desk fan at the bottom and a desk light with a 75 watt bulb in it and a big bowl of water and a thermometer that reads humitity and started practicing keeping it one temp. After 4 days I finally figured out how to keep the doors slightly ajar that the temp would hold at 98 to 99, I have about a 89 to 96 percent hatch rate. I have had 2 groups of 80 eggs that none hatched but I have set a total of 350 eggs in it at once and had 315 hatch out, the rest were either not fertile or they started and stopped very early. I need to buy one that is small just to hatch quail in since they are very small and get out of my big one.

That's awesome you seen embryos moving in all the eggs! Sounds like everything is on track. .....and congrats on the soon to be grandma title....

....that's funny! I've been looking into ducks and will probably be getting them sometime. I'd love to built them a pen that looks they they are in the wild.

Sorry to hear about your chicks arriving like that! I hope the next ones arrive safe and sound! I'm getting 2 Silver Laced Wyandottes, 2 Columbian Wyandottes, 2 Speckled Sussex and 2 Buff Orpington, all pullets......25 red rangers......6 cornish cross and whatever mystery chick they send on April 1st. So I don't have to wait that long for chicks, I'm getting some from the feed store around the last of feb or the first of march, whenever they get them. From their I'll get a couple Red Star, Black Star, Rhode Island Red, Barred Rock and my first half a dozen or so turkeys. I wish I could of got a few turkeys sent with the chicks I ordered, but they don't send a few turkeys with chicks. Can't wait!

Dang...you're a chick hatching machine!....lol. Sounds like an awesome thing to do with making your own incubator! I'm going to try it for sure! ...and think I can have a good start going by what you mentioned there. Thanks for that, I appreciate it! Knowing how to hatch eggs out of an incubator will be another thing I'd like to cross off my list of things to know how to do.

 

[Garrisonkidsduo2]

That's awesome you seen embryos moving in all the eggs! Sounds like everything is on track. .....and congrats on the soon to be grandma title....

....that's funny! I've been looking into ducks and will probably be getting them sometime. I'd love to built them a pen that looks they they are in the wild.

Sorry to hear about your chicks arriving like that! I hope the next ones arrive safe and sound! I'm getting 2 Silver Laced Wyandottes, 2 Columbian Wyandottes, 2 Speckled Sussex and 2 Buff Orpington, all pullets......25 red rangers......6 cornish cross and whatever mystery chick they send on April 1st. So I don't have to wait that long for chicks, I'm getting some from the feed store around the last of feb or the first of march, whenever they get them. From their I'll get a couple Red Star, Black Star, Rhode Island Red, Barred Rock and my first half a dozen or so turkeys. I wish I could of got a few turkeys sent with the chicks I ordered, but they don't send a few turkeys with chicks. Can't wait!

Dang...you're a chick hatching machine!....lol. Sounds like an awesome thing to do with making your own incubator! I'm going to try it for sure! ...and think I can have a good start going by what you mentioned there. Thanks for that, I appreciate it! Knowing how to hatch eggs out of an incubator will be another thing I'd like to cross off my list of things to know how to do.

I have a cross breed of duck that I just love. For one you never know what is going to hatch out. We have had black ducks that look purple in the sun. I have one that is white and has a grey stripe down his back and makes him look like a skunk. we have had greys and some are greys with white. We have ducks with puff balls on there heads and some without. We have some that are brown and some that are white with a black bill and feet. I have pictures of some of them. We no longer have any of the pekins. All the solid whites with yellow feet and bill we got rid of because we weren't getting the color on the ducks. And the great thing about these hens I have and have been hatching is they lay everyday, They molt and lay eggs through the molt but right after they molt they won't lay for like 30 days and then they go back to laying all over again.

 

[3acres]

I have a cross breed of duck that I just love. For one you never know what is going to hatch out. We have had black ducks that look purple in the sun. I have one that is white and has a grey stripe down his back and makes him look like a skunk. we have had greys and some are greys with white. We have ducks with puff balls on there heads and some without. We have some that are brown and some that are white with a black bill and feet. I have pictures of some of them. We no longer have any of the pekins. All the solid whites with yellow feet and bill we got rid of because we weren't getting the color on the ducks. And the great thing about these hens I have and have been hatching is they lay everyday, They molt and lay eggs through the molt but right after they molt they won't lay for like 30 days and then they go back to laying all over again.

Thanks for the duck pics!...they look real neat! That's interesting on their laying and molting habbits. Sounds like that would be neat to see what color they come out as. I see some tint on that one black duck in the pictures. I might have to come home with ducks sooner than I thought...lol. I hear they are good for eating insects around the barnyard, but can be known for traveling great distances just to poo on your sidewalks....lol.

 

[3acres]

a couple of pics I ran into today of chicks I brought home from the feed store last year.

 

[Garrisonkidsduo2]

I candled my hens eggs tonight and we still have 11 out of 11 eggs going strong. She is still setting on the eggs i guess she is going to be a good mom.

 

[3acres]

I candled my hens eggs tonight and we still have 11 out of 11 eggs going strong. She is still setting on the eggs i guess she is going to be a good mom.

Good deal! Thanks for the update....does sound like things are a go.

I'm getting ready to start in on making an incubator out of the mini frig I have that isn't any good anymore. Should be interesting. Still hoping my hen goes broody again though and will try to set that up sometime if she hasn't started herself yet.

 

[Garrisonkidsduo2]

Well first let me start by saying I caught the broody hen hen off her nest last night eating so I took the chance to candle the eggs again yes again. All were good but after I was done candling I realized that there is 12 eggs. All eggs are at the same stage so she laid an egg when she started to set on this nest. All 12 eggs are doing good. I gave her 12 eggs but her moving them she broke one and left it and sat on 11 but now she has 12 she laid an egg. I only have 11 to 12 days left before they hatch. I am hoping they all hatch.

 

[Garrisonkidsduo2]

I have 11 days left before my broody hens is due to be a mom.

 

[3acres]

It'll be here before you know it! Neat thing on the bonus egg.

 

[Garrisonkidsduo2]

Okay i have 6 more days and the due date is here been keeping a very close eye on her and the eggs hope it hurries up