August Hatch-A-Long

[jolenesdad]

On the plus side, 3 babies seems like a perfect amount for a new mommy. :0)

 

[CluckNDoodle]

I was coming here, too, hoping for a good update from @Bookworm0124!

I lost one of mama's babies last night. :-( Poor thing.

Always learning.

I think the best option lies somewhere in the middle of the general advice, as even broody hens aren't totally set it and forget it. I totally understand breeders not wanting to "help" chicks, but, Im really not convinced AT ALL that helping a chick in the first few minutes or days of life means you're doomed to repeat the same cycle even if you breed that chick. There are SO MANY Issues caused by incubation and human interaction to incubation. I think I probably should have treated these eggs as shipped eggs under the broody. Especially when in the end, I got 3/11. :-\ My broody hatch from local eggs, if I count the loss today (which I think 36 hours after hatch should be counted as a loss), is my worst hatch so far!

There was one egg that had zipped and was stuck in a zip for 8+ hours. I popped the top off, and put it back under mom. I really probably should have taken it into the incubator and ensured it got Nutri drench and food. It clearly had been in the shell too long after absorbing the yolk, it didn't want to lift its head out when I removed the top of the shell that was zipped all the way around. I had two black chicks hatch, and that was one of them, and it was a black chick that died, so I am assuming that was it.

NEXT TIME, especially since I have SUCH docile birds, I'll plan on monitoring just a bit more. I should have candled for REAL all along the way to remove the exploders. What an elementary mistake there. I just occasionally picked up one of the eggs and put my phone light on it and said, ooooh, air cell.... good. Plus, I should have removed this zipping chick after a couple of hours. I just was thinking "Broody mom, don't do ANYTHING."

As an aside, Im really not at all interested in breeding directly to the SOP and showing, I'm mostly interested in preserving some breeds and breeding for local climate vigor and hopefully working my own line towards more utility. You can bet your butt that I am going to absolutely try and breed "assisted" chicks, monitor their hatches, and debunk this theory that you shouldn't assist chicks.

I'm so sorry you lost a little one, there might not have been anything you could do even if you did step in.
I do 2 or 3 serious candlings under my broody hens. I usually wait until it's dark and just set the broody asideI or I have brought a basket of the eggs into a dark closet during the day when the broody was up eating. My hens don't really seem to mind being handled though, and I even lift them almost daily to make sure there aren't any new eggs.
I think it's a great idea to hatch eggs from assisted chicks. I think the only reason it hasn't been debunked is because not many people keep track of which chicks were assisted by the time they're mature and laying.

On the plus side, 3 babies seems like a perfect amount for a new mommy. :0)

I can't wait to see pictures!!

 

[Erba]

Sorry about the loss of that chick.

Always learning

I can't agree more. We are all always learning, especially from what went wrong. If you hadn't helped, i think it would have died under the hen eventually. Things unfortunately happen.
I really have to properly candle more too! Could have saved me from a lot of disappointment, before the hatch.
big hug!

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

I was coming here, too, hoping for a good update from @Bookworm0124!

I lost one of mama's babies last night. :-( Poor thing.

Always learning.

I think the best option lies somewhere in the middle of the general advice, as even broody hens aren't totally set it and forget it. I totally understand breeders not wanting to "help" chicks, but, Im really not convinced AT ALL that helping a chick in the first few minutes or days of life means you're doomed to repeat the same cycle even if you breed that chick. There are SO MANY Issues caused by incubation and human interaction to incubation. I think I probably should have treated these eggs as shipped eggs under the broody. Especially when in the end, I got 3/11. :-\ My broody hatch from local eggs, if I count the loss today (which I think 36 hours after hatch should be counted as a loss), is my worst hatch so far!

There was one egg that had zipped and was stuck in a zip for 8+ hours. I popped the top off, and put it back under mom. I really probably should have taken it into the incubator and ensured it got Nutri drench and food. It clearly had been in the shell too long after absorbing the yolk, it didn't want to lift its head out when I removed the top of the shell that was zipped all the way around. I had two black chicks hatch, and that was one of them, and it was a black chick that died, so I am assuming that was it.

NEXT TIME, especially since I have SUCH docile birds, I'll plan on monitoring just a bit more. I should have candled for REAL all along the way to remove the exploders. What an elementary mistake there. I just occasionally picked up one of the eggs and put my phone light on it and said, ooooh, air cell.... good. Plus, I should have removed this zipping chick after a couple of hours. I just was thinking "Broody mom, don't do ANYTHING."

As an aside, Im really not at all interested in breeding directly to the SOP and showing, I'm mostly interested in preserving some breeds and breeding for local climate vigor and hopefully working my own line towards more utility. You can bet your butt that I am going to absolutely try and breed "assisted" chicks, monitor their hatches, and debunk this theory that you shouldn't assist chicks.

Sorry that it didn’t go super smooth, but glad that you have the three. When we incubated under the broody, I candled all eggs at day 14 while mom was off the nest, to remove any clears and quitters. I was vaccinating eggs at day 18, so I put six ceramic eggs in the incubator so they were warm, then exchanged them with the real eggs. I vaccinated each egg then put back in incubator and then exchanged the eggs again. So, my plan was basically to substitute ceramic eggs when I wanted to do something more extensive with real eggs. Agree that assists under a broody are frustrating and challenging.

As far as philosophy of not assisting, my hesitations is mainly this: from reading and posting on BYC, I think a lot of inexperienced people will assist when it’s not needed. Since they are inexperienced, they may not know when to intervene or how to safely do it. I also think that poor incubation conditions can result in no viable chicks, chicks that die in the egg or after an assist. I don’t think that there’s enough recognition that the chicks may not be getting out of the egg because they didn’t develop right, so they die in egg or soon after hatching due to their abnormalities (poor immune or gut function, slipped tendons, prolapsed yolk or gut, etc). Then people have a lot of guilt about that chick that didn’t make it, or that bleeds out as they intervene, or the yolk prolapses. So, for advising new incubators, I think that erring on the side of caution in helping out is best. BTW, I put myself in this category. I’m hesitant to assist because I often feel that I’m more likely to do harm than good...

 

[jolenesdad]

Sorry that it didn’t go super smooth, but glad that you have the three. When we incubated under the broody, I candled all eggs at day 14 while mom was off the nest, to remove any clears and quitters. I was vaccinating eggs at day 18, so I put six ceramic eggs in the incubator so they were warm, then exchanged them with the real eggs. I vaccinated each egg then put back in incubator and then exchanged the eggs again. So, my plan was basically to substitute ceramic eggs when I wanted to do something more extensive with real eggs. Agree that assists under a broody are frustrating and challenging.

As far as philosophy of not assisting, my hesitations is mainly this: from reading and posting on BYC, I think a lot of inexperienced people will assist when it’s not needed. Since they are inexperienced, they may not know when to intervene or how to safely do it. I also think that poor incubation conditions can result in no viable chicks, chicks that die in the egg or after an assist. I don’t think that there’s enough recognition that the chicks may not be getting out of the egg because they didn’t develop right, so they die in egg or soon after hatching due to their abnormalities (poor immune or gut function, slipped tendons, prolapsed yolk or gut, etc). Then people have a lot of guilt about that chick that didn’t make it, or that bleeds out as they intervene, or the yolk prolapses. So, for advising new incubators, I think that erring on the side of caution in helping out is best. BTW, I put myself in this category. I’m hesitant to assist because I often feel that I’m more likely to do harm than good...

Great post. I wholeheartedly agree. What I don’t agree with chicken folk is somewhere along the line there is this switch with poultry keepers that goes from advice to “you must follow my way or you’re an idiot”. Especially with breeders/showers. It’s really.... annoying. That’s why I love this group. There’s so much less of that here than in the breed groups.

My personal thought is there is absolutely no way to replicate nature in an incubator, so a majority of the issues are caused by us anyway. You do anything other than let the broody hatch the eggs she laid and decided to sit on.... and you’ve got variables at play.


On another note UGHHHHHHH @CluckNDoodle why did we get jinxed? ALL of my mottled Orps are boys too! I haven’t decided what to do.

What DOES everyone here do with heritage breed cockerels they hatch?

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

Great post. I wholeheartedly agree. What I don’t agree with chicken folk is somewhere along the line there is this switch with poultry keepers that goes from advice to “you must follow my way or you’re an idiot”. Especially with breeders/showers. It’s really.... annoying. That’s why I love this group. There’s so much less of that here than in the breed groups.

My personal thought is there is absolutely no way to replicate nature in an incubator, so a majority of the issues are caused by us anyway. You do anything other than let the broody hatch the eggs she laid and decided to sit on.... and you’ve got variables at play.


On another note UGHHHHHHH @CluckNDoodle why did we get jinxed? ALL of my mottled Orps are boys too! I haven’t decided what to do.

What DOES everyone here do with heritage breed cockerels they hatch?

Sorry about the cockerels!!! For myself, still very slooooooowwwlllllyyy preparing to butcher our unneeded cockerels...

 

[jolenesdad]

Sorry about the cockerels!!! For myself, still very slooooooowwwlllllyyy preparing to butcher our unneeded cockerels...

That’s where I ultimately want to get but I can’t push the limits with a ton of crowers, so I’m not really energized to butcher them if they’re really small. But maybe I need to get over that. They’re still meat.

Maybe they will be like my Delaware boy.... 16 weeks, no sign of crowing yet.

 

[CluckNDoodle]

@CluckNDoodle why did we get jinxed? ALL of my mottled Orps are boys too! I haven’t decided what to do.

What DOES everyone here do with heritage breed cockerels they hatch?

Noooo!!! it was fairly easy to re-home the Mottled Orpington cockerels. I shared an image of the flock rooster so they know what bloodline the chicks came from. It helped that he was gorgeous. Lol

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

Noooo!!! it was fairly easy to re-home the Mottled Orpington cockerels. I shared an image of the flock rooster so they know what bloodline the chicks came from. It helped that he was gorgeous. Lol

Totally with you!!! If I could rehome I certainly would!!!!

 

[CluckNDoodle]

Totally with you!!! If I could rehome I certainly would!!!!

I actually think butchering them is probably much more beneficial to you but as I've confessed before, I'm too big a baby to do so, lol. I'm also in a neighborhood like jolenesdad and I worry about keeping them on the property long enough to fill out and "announcing" their presence.