Bielefelder hatch 2019

[danceswithronin]

Now that the temp and humidity are stable, I set the eggs! I also marked each of them with a number 1 through 7. I'll mark what I find for each egg when I candle on Day 7.

I ordered ten eggs and got a dozen, so I had five left over:

I'm planning on buying another incubator (same type) and setting these too, hopefully a day or two delay in setting them won't affect hatching rates too bad.

 

[danceswithronin]

I'm fighting the urge to acquire some BF hatching eggs...will have to live vicariously through your thread for now, since I have two batches of chicken eggs in the incubator already. The problem is that I know there are spares just waiting to be filled...

Particularly interested in seeing if the auto-sexing at hatch is as easy as with Cream Legbars. And nice choice of incubator - should be a breeze to prep for your eggs.

Thanks! The incubator was a bit pricey to only hold seven eggs, but I have a lot of confidence in Brinsea products so to me it's one of those "you get what you pay for" things. I'd rather buy two small expensive incubators that work well than one large one with hatching issues.

I'm hoping the autosexing feature plus the rarity of the breed will help me sell these easily, I am thinking of charging 20 per female chick and 10 per male chick since I have never seen them for sale locally.

 

[MROO]

Thanks! The incubator was a bit pricey to only hold seven eggs, but I have a lot of confidence in Brinsea products so to me it's one of those "you get what you pay for" things. I'd rather buy two small expensive incubators that work well than one large one with hatching issues.

I'm hoping the autosexing feature plus the rarity of the breed will help me sell these easily, I am thinking of charging 20 per female chick and 10 per male chick since I have never seen them for sale locally.

Also - consider selling them as "pairs only." That way you don't have people buying just the pullets and leaving you with a bunch of bachelor chicks. That would also encourage people to raise them on their own, which may help boost the breed.

 

[danceswithronin]

Also - consider selling them as "pairs only." That way you don't have people buying just the pullets and leaving you with a bunch of bachelor chicks. That would also encourage people to raise them on their own, which may help boost the breed.

I had considered this, or either offering them as a breeding trio - one cockerel to two pullets. I'm not sure how much to price them for though? The 12 eggs with shipping cost me $35.00, and I'm not really worried about recouping my money on feed yet. I'm in the process of converting over to growing and processing a lot of my own homemade feed so that aspect should take care of itself.

My overarching goal is to hatch particularly rare breeds of chickens or color varieties of popular chickens (ex. chocolate splash Orpingtons, candy corn Polish) that I can charge enough money for to make actually make a bit of a decent side hustle out of it. I figure if I'm going to try to make money on the side past my full-time job, I may as well make money doing something I like, and animal husbandry is top of the list. Plus it'll give me the opportunity to set aside special birds I particularly like for myself.

It'll all depend on the hatching rate too though I guess, and what my ratio of pullets to cockerels is. I'd originally intended to save back a chick for myself, but since my own flock is going to hit ten by the end of the month with an incoming hatchery order, I may need to wait and get one later on down the line.

My first monetary goal is to make enough money to make back the cost of my incubators, or at least a large chunk of it.

 

[danceswithronin]

I think I might be undercutting myself pricewise after looking at other bielefelders for sale - I think I will offer them $50 per breeding pair or $30 per female chick and $20 per male chick. That's with delivery thrown in if they want (within a reasonable distance) and with no minimum order, so I think that's pretty good.

 

[MROO]

I think I might be undercutting myself pricewise after looking at other bielefelders for sale - I think I will offer them $50 per breeding pair or $30 per female chick and $20 per male chick. That's with delivery thrown in if they want (within a reasonable distance) and with no minimum order, so I think that's pretty good.

Or $30 per female and $25 per male - with a $5.00 discount for buying a pair @ $50.00. But you're right - it all depends on your ratio of "pink-to-blue!" They sure are gorgeous birds, though. I wish I had room for standards, but I'll just continue to live vicariously through my bantams!

 

[danceswithronin]

Or $30 per female and $25 per male - with a $5.00 discount for buying a pair @ $50.00. But you're right - it all depends on your ratio of "pink-to-blue!" They sure are gorgeous birds, though. I wish I had room for standards, but I'll just continue to live vicariously through my bantams!

Good idea! I'll probably do this, at least unless it looks like the chicks won't move. I doubt it though, when I went to sell my silkies through a local Facebook group I sold them in five minutes and had a waiting list of ten people willing to buy them if the first guy fell through (he didn't).

I'm not too concerned about being able to move the cockerels either, for some reason roosters seem to sell very well in my area and as beautiful as bielefelder roosters are, I'm sure there'd be tons of people dying to add them to their flocks.

 

[danceswithronin]

Okay, ended up posting some ads for upcoming chicks $30 per female, $20 per male, $40 per breeding pair. If I manage to sell them all for those prices I will probably make enough to cover the cost of the chicks and my first incubator and then some. I won't have to buy any new chick feed for them probably, as I just bought several bags at once a few days ago and my own chickens won't go through it that quickly.

 

[FoodFreedomNow]

Thanks! The incubator was a bit pricey to only hold seven eggs, but I have a lot of confidence in Brinsea products so to me it's one of those "you get what you pay for" things. I'd rather buy two small expensive incubators that work well than one large one with hatching issues.

I'm hoping the autosexing feature plus the rarity of the breed will help me sell these easily, I am thinking of charging 20 per female chick and 10 per male chick since I have never seen them for sale locally.

I think the Minis are a nice size, but I rarely only have 7 eggs to set...I keep hoping to find another (now vintage, it seems) Octagon Advance like the one I already have - it's rock solid.

It's good that you're already doing market research and formulating a plan to manage your stock. Since I hatch, I always end up with more roosters than I need or can reasonably integrate - even of very desirable breeds, like FBCM - and since Bielefelder roos look to be of good size, extras could also be a source of meat, if you're so inclined (as a last resort). I don't give away roosters, though many other people in my area do. Even better, though, would be to have your market snap up any handsome "extra" roosters you have!

 

[danceswithronin]

I think the Minis are a nice size, but I rarely only have 7 eggs to set...I keep hoping to find another (now vintage, it seems) Octagon Advance like the one I already have - it's rock solid.

It's good that you're already doing market research and formulating a plan to manage your stock. Since I hatch, I always end up with more roosters than I need or can reasonably integrate - even of very desirable breeds, like FBCM - and since Bielefelder roos look to be of good size, extras could also be a source of meat, if you're so inclined (as a last resort). I don't give away roosters, though many other people in my area do. Even better, though, would be to have your market snap up any handsome "extra" roosters you have!

I've already got a list of people interested going on a few local chicken groups, so I'll be selling the chicks first come first serve there. Super rare breeds like bielefelders and deathlayers and things like that seem really uncommon in the deep South, especially in rural areas, so I'm getting a lot of interest there based on novelty alone.

On the other hand, I won't be hatching out silkies or other fad bantams in the future as I'd previously planned because it turns out the market is absolutely saturated with them, even though they do sell well and are cute to raise. I'd rather focus on difficult to source breeds like bielefelders, vorwerks, or very rare patterns/colors like candy corn/tolbunt Polish, chocolate Orps, etc...

I have no problem culling cockerels to eat and would rather cull them than give them away. I wouldn't mind giving away a barnyard mix, but I feel like giving away bielefelder roosters would only devalue the rest of my own selling stock. I just have to cull very early because I'm in city limits and can't have roosters.