Adventures in Incubating Shipped Eggs

[Ursuline Chick]

How far were they shipped from? It could be the seller, or it could be a case of rough travels through the postal system.

I feel like a vampire, obsessed with prominent veining.

Or a nurse!!

 

[Morrigan]

21 days is a long time.

 

[Cerise1924]

Watching others progress with interest, I had 24 shipped copper black maran eggs in a brinsea octagon, auto turner and dry hatch. Candled last Saturday on day 10 , had to toss 8 eggs, no development, rest looking good. Will await hatch day for results as I don’t like to interfere too much , might give a quick candle at lockdown.

2/3 developing by Day 10 sounds good to me. BCMs are so beautiful. Looking forward to hearing how things go.
-Cerise

 

[Cerise1924]

I am interested too. I have been hand turning and left them vertical in a cut down egg carton because my incubator's auto turner only rolls them horizontally. It is a huge pain to hand turn and I am concerned because I can only do it 3 times a day (before work at 6am, after work at 5pm and before bed at 10pm) worried that is not enough. I am looking into buying a larger incubator and wondering everyone else uses for shipped eggs. I have narrowed it down to Hovabator Genesis, Incuview, or Nuture right 360. Any input would greatly be appreciated. As I am still developing by breeding flock I see more shipped eggs in my future.
Update on my hatch so far 18 eggs on day 10- 3 clear and 3 early quit with wanky air cells and blood rings. The other 12 have good air cells and moving embryos.

I have had some excellent hatches with shipped eggs. I can get just about any breed I want, instead of the small local selection, and it is much, much cheaper than buying these heritage and rare breed chickens.

12 out of 18 sounds great! That's a 2/3 success rate so far, which is promising.

Like you, I can only turn 3 times - once before work, at 5:30 am, once when I get home, at 5:30 pm, and then again at bedtime, which for me is about 8:30. But the eggs seem to be doing fine, and on my days off, I can rotate eggs more frequently. I think you and I will do okay with the hand turning.

 

[Cerise1924]

We got 6 Silkie eggs in the mail and only 1 made it. Some have told me that about normal other had said I should at least got 3 to hatch out of the 6.

I'm glad you got one, at least. From my experience, 50% hatch rate for shipped eggs is about average, and that seems to be the general consensus from what I read, as well. However, it's not that I always get 50% of the eggs (3 out of 6, for example to hatch healthy chicks). Sometimes, I'll get is a hatch like the one you had (1 out of 6), and then with a different batch of eggs from a different breeder, I'll get 5 out of 6 to hatch. It all works out to about 50% over time. There are just so many variables: fertility, jostling in shipping, bacteria, hairline cracks, temperature fluctuations in shipping, and so on...

 

[lawson1986]

Sounds like you have a great broodie there. But yes I would also take her off the nest and maybe place her else where for a bit till she 's not setting on everyones eggs. Let her now be the momma she wants to be give her the babies and see how good a mom she is.

I am definately taking her off the nest and taking the eggs away. However, I also have taken the babies away and placed them in a brooder because those baby killing original silkies live in that enclosure as well. And I like living babies, not dead ones!

 

[cppeace]

I'm a third of the way there lol

 

[Cerise1924]

I did a full candling on my eggs today (Day 6)

I see good, solid development on 4 out of 9 orpington eggs. They look like this:

View attachment 1391306

The veining was clearer to my naked eye, but I had a hard time capturing it on the phone.

Of the remain 5 orp. eggs, 2 are almost certainly clears (but I'm going to leave them in for a couple more days just to make dead sure). Here is one of them:

View attachment 1391309

Of the remaining 3 orp. eggs, I couldn't be sure if I was seeing blood rings or circular veining. I was having trouble taking clear pictures, and I didn't want to keep fiddling with the eggs, so no pictures of these. I'll recheck those in a couple of days as well.

I still really can't tell with the Maran eggs. I thought I could see darker areas and maybe veining on all them, so I'm hopeful. Here is the porous one.

View attachment 1391311

So, mixed results, but the good news is there are definitely viable eggs in there. I have the doubtful and maybes grouped together so I can check them easily in another couple of days.

Thanks for sharing the pics @Morrigan
I like your idea of grouping the not-so-goods and maybes together, to make it easy to re-check them. My good ones are looking so strong, I don't feel the need to candle them again until Day 10 or even 14... but I'd like to check on the iffy ones in a couple of days, and having them near each other is smart. I think I'll follow your lead and group mine when I hand turn tonight.
-Cerise

 

[lawson1986]

More shipped fertile eggs arrived today: some Buff Brahma Bantam eggs, and still waiting for my next batch oh FBCM and BLRW eggs to come that I ordered. Obviously even with 3 incubators going, this is going to be a tricky staggered hatch for me with all these different shipped eggs I have been ordering. I candled my incubator full of shipped bantam eggs, and removed 10 eggs that were not fertile, 8 of which were the mille fleur bantam Cochins :-( Hoping for at least 2 of those to hatch to make it financially worth the cost of the eggs

 

[Morrigan]

I can't wait to start hearing hatch stores and seeing hatch pictures from everyone.