Adventures in Incubating Shipped Eggs

[Cerise1924]

Candled the Olandsk Dwarf x Cream Legbar eggs, Day 5. No sign of any development in any egg. Will try again tomorrow or on Day 7.

Belgian D'Uccles eggs arrived - they are so tiny! Six are Golden Neck, four are Mille Fleurs, and the rest are unmarked. The eggs look fresh, with very small air cells. Set them upright in an egg carton when they arrived, but it's been in the upper 80s in the house. I think I'll go put them in the incubator.

 

[Cerise1924]

Candled and culled. Day six, earlier than I would usually do it, but I decided I needed to thin the crowding some.

30 eggs set.
17 eggs showing visible veins.
5 eggs that I'm sure are no good, but for one reason or other, had enough question to leave in.
8 eggs clear, which were removed, opened, and confirmed to have never started.

Some of the eggs with visible veins, I didn't actually see any embryo... it almost looked like the veins were extending down from the air pocket, instead of from an embryo. Unless it was just up at the top in the middle!

The cracked egg is still looking good and going strong.

It sounds like you made a wise choice in selecting which eggs to thin out. I'm impressed that the cracked egg is doing so well! I wonder if my glitter glue egg will develop.

 

[Zinjifrah]

Candled the Olandsk Dwarf x Cream Legbar eggs, Day 5. No sign of any development in any egg. Will try again tomorrow or on Day 7.

Belgian D'Uccles eggs arrived - they are so tiny! Six are Golden Neck, four are Mille Fleurs, and the rest are unmarked. The eggs look fresh, with very small air cells. Set them upright in an egg carton when they arrived, but it's been in the upper 80s in the house. I think I'll go put them in the incubator.

I had to look up the reason for 'resting' eggs before putting them in the incubator to remind myself why. I was thinking it was to settle the air pockets, but that's why you don't turn them for a couple days... it's to let them adjust to the temperature, warm up if necessary, before putting them under heat. Heh!

It sounds like you made a wise choice in selecting which eggs to thin out. I'm impressed that the cracked egg is doing so well! I wonder if my glitter glue egg will develop.

Hopefully! I was pretty amazed to see such a strong spiderweb in the cracked egg, especially considering how bad the cracks are!

 

[Rebel58]

Chick Spam! One of the few nice things about a blisteringly hot day is that you can take a brand new chick outside. She napped in the sunshine, and met the flock. One of the 5 week old Svart Honas even let her snuggle. These Svarts are the sweetest birds.
Tomorrow will be 96 degrees - almost too hot for a baby! My hens are walking around airing their wingpits.

 

[Rebel58]

Well done! Pictures?

As promised, just a little late. First pic is the one I assisted. #3 is adorable.

 

[Morrigan]

What cuties!

 

[Cerise1924]

As promised, just a little late. First pic is the one I assisted. #3 is adorable.

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Beautiful babies! So glad you had a successful assisted hatch. Tell me more about these three!

 

[Zinjifrah]

This is very peculiar...

I appear to be down to 11 viable-looking eggs, including the cracked one. Six of the eggs I'd marked as having veining appear to have failed.

However, I left those in... and took out the five that I'd marked as probable failures. Cracked and examined them - and all five had blood inside. But they had no sign of an embryo ever having started, let alone died. Nothing - just blood. I had noticed when candling that several eggs appeared to have veins that came from the air pocket, instead of an embryo, but just figured that the embryo was up near the air pocket. Now I'm questioning that.

 

[Rebel58]

This is very peculiar...

I appear to be down to 11 viable-looking eggs, including the cracked one. Six of the eggs I'd marked as having veining appear to have failed.

However, I left those in... and took out the five that I'd marked as probable failures. Cracked and examined them - and all five had blood inside. But they had no sign of an embryo ever having started, let alone died. Nothing - just blood. I had noticed when candling that several eggs appeared to have veins that came from the air pocket, instead of an embryo, but just figured that the embryo was up near the air pocket. Now I'm questioning that.

 

[Cerise1924]

This is very peculiar...

I appear to be down to 11 viable-looking eggs, including the cracked one. Six of the eggs I'd marked as having veining appear to have failed.

However, I left those in... and took out the five that I'd marked as probable failures. Cracked and examined them - and all five had blood inside. But they had no sign of an embryo ever having started, let alone died. Nothing - just blood. I had noticed when candling that several eggs appeared to have veins that came from the air pocket, instead of an embryo, but just figured that the embryo was up near the air pocket. Now I'm questioning that.

I'm sorry that so many of the eggs have failed to develop. Thanks for sharing your investigation. I don't do eggtospies, so it is a great benefit for me to be able to learn from yours.

Right now, I have no idea what's gone wrong. I re-ordered the Olandsk-Legbar cross eggs; yesterday was Day 7, and there was not one sign of a spiderweb. One egg was seeping from a hairline crack, and one had a blood ring. The other twelve looked either clear or cloudy, but showed zero sign of developing.

I'll candle again, but if there is no sign of development by Day 10 or 12, I suppose I'll have to throw the whole lot out.

I hope you have a good hatch from your remaining 11 eggs.