Anyone hatching Dec 14th? Looking for hatching buddies for 1st hatch!

[4CrazyGirlz]

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Lol - I thought of my signature after looking at new2chooks signature. Something like "Hi I'm Kelly and I have....."

I'll tell you what... We just moved to our 5 acre mini farm and the farmer has really come out in the whole family. I could never live in the city again. I always kind of longed to get out into the country but I never realized how liberating and positive it would be.

I have 2 out of 9 of my eggs on lockdown that just pipped! Should have some fuzzy bottoms tomorrow when I wake up.

I candled all 28 eggs in the other incubator today (day 5) and had good growth on all but 1 (blood ring)

Here is a photo of what one of my eggs looked like today if anyone without candling experience is wondering what to look for.

http://www.heavilyread.com/chicks/egg-candling-day-5.jpg

The dark spot in the middle is the actual embryo and you can see veins coming out to make it look almost like a spider. In general, any veins you see are a good sign. This is a teeny tiny mille fleur D'Uccle egg so the embryo looks huge. In a standard size egg it would look smaller. (At least mine do)

I just use a 9 LED mini flashlight to candle with. It works great even on darker eggs. I was able to see veining on day 3.

LOL!! I was wondering why your embryos looked so much larger. Now I know! Great pic! The girls were so excited to see the little pulsing embryos in ours. I took pics and will post probably tomorrow. I have a few that I am pretty sure are NOT going to do anything. Of course my daughter keeps telling me, "Just wait Mommy, maybe they are just a little slow". How long would you wait before removing the eggs? Also is there any trick to candling the dark eggs? My BCM eggs are so dark I can not hardly see anything. I am pretty sure I can see an embryo in the slightly lighter of the two BCM's, but I may need one of those giant spot lights they use to signal sales at car dealerships or something for the other one.

Can't wait to see your fuzz balls!

 

[Eggcellent]

You can wait 2 weeks without a real problem. Just look for any weeping and funky smells. I would err on the side of caution and leave em in until you are positive they are not developing. I have never cracked a good egg but I can imagine that it would be a terrible feeling. I did take a questionable one out at day 18 on a previous hatch and it didn't stink or anything when I cracked it open to check if my candling was correct.

One good way to tell is after about 10 days by looking for a yolk that floats to the top when the rest of the egg is pretty much clear. Pretty easy to see this and it will look quite different from the developing eggs. Blood rings can be a little more difficult to tell because they are red, but it will become more obvious as the eggs grow. The others will continue to grow and there will be movement in the live embryos. Really a cool thing to see.

I tried to candle some dark eggs with a 250w light bulb but I never had real success. I was so worried about heating the egg up too much I couldn't leave it on the candler very long. Maybe someone else can give you some tips but I would just leave them in for the long haul unless they get weepy or smelly.

 

[Suechick]

HI everyone, Can I join your party? I have 20 eggs set to hatch on the 9th or 10th. I'll be candling them on Sunday, day 10.
I'm up way late tonight checking on coop designs.
I am ridiculously excited about chickens.

 

[4CrazyGirlz]

Of course you can join Suechick! The 10th is my b-day so I am crossing my fingers for you to have a hatch on the 10th.

Eggcellent.....do you have any little cheepers yet this morning??

Can't wait to see them!

 

[Suechick]

Thanks crazy girl.
I have 5 4 week old chicks in a brooder. We hatched a month ago in a home made incubator but didn't get enough chicks. Is there such a thing as enough?.... Anyway, I was bugged by the low hatch rate and went to work on the incubator to make it better, stronger and faster.

So, i think I have the kinks worked out and we're hoping for a better hatch rate this time. I really can't wait to candle them, I'm just dying to know how many of the eggs are developing...

 

[Eggcellent]

Well one of my chicks that are due today hatched around noon. Here is a pic of her/him shortly after breaking out of the egg shell.

I have 4 more that have pipped, and 4 that haven't so far.

 

[Eggcellent]

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Welcome to the thread Suechick - what kind of eggs do you have in the incubator

 

[Suechick]

Congratulations Eggcellent!

Crazygirl - I have Plymoth Barred Rocks, Rhode Island Reds, and a few mystery eggs, 20 in all. I won them on ebay as a mixed lot.

I saw you have some Marans, those are fabulous colored eggs! You can't see into them when you candle, can you?

 

[ethingtonart]

Eggcellent, what a wonderful picture!! So cute!!!

 

[Jaguar6]

I am incubating 26 eggs for the 12th and 6 for the 14th....I'm in