This was an ill-fated, bad-omened incubation from the first. When I picked the eggs up from my friend they were far colder than I thought they should have been -- not refrigerator-cold, just been out in temperatures ranging from 32 to 45 degrees cold. I'm not complaining, the eggs were free and very fresh, and my friend was suffering from what was about to turn into one of those two-and-a-half week long illnesses that can't make up its mind whether it's a cold or the flu or the Romulan Plague. I just hoped that the fresh would outweigh the frozen aspect.
Then there was the incubator. I had purchased a King Suro 20 last year to hatch out the parents of these eggs, because I had to go out of town unexpectedly and my spouse was going to have his hands full with the kids and the birds we already had. When I bought it the Suro thread at BYC had nothing but praise for it...when I went back to the Suro thread the week before I picked up the eggs the posts were decidedly anti-King Suro 20. Phrases like "Fan is unsteady, makes noises, dies quickly" and "Digital thermometer inaccurate by several degrees" are not designed to instill any sort of confidence. It was also when I turned to the spouse, who had been complaining about me setting the incubator too far in advance, and said "THIS is why I set up early!" Yes, the fan on my machine was wonky. I found and installed a replacement. Then I put every thermometer I had in the house in it. The Suro digital said it was 100 degrees, the other digital said it was 94, and the two analogs said it was 97. I went with the analogs, heart in boots, and set the Suro to what it thought was 102.4 and what the analogs said was between 99 and 100. Oddly enough, both digitals agreed on the humidity, so I left it at 50 percent. When everything had been steady for a few days, I collected the eggs, crossed my fingers, and prepared for the worst.
Oh yes. And I'd lost my candler. The mag-light I have -- at least 4 D cells long and hefty enough to knock out your average home-invader, providing you had the time and opportunity to do so -- provided enough light that I could tell at least 5 of the 6 were growing. The 6th just never developed at all. However, it really didn't look like the air space was expanding like it should with the developing eggs. Fingernails on right hand were chewed about halfway up to the elbow. Then I realized I'd also broken a cardinal rule -- I hadn't marked any of the eggs with due dates, and I'd completely forgotten when they were supposed to hatch. Just. Great.
Monday night, just before I bundled the kids off to their Grandmother's for an overnight stay, my youngest said, "Mom, it looks like this eggs is cracking!" By golly, the child is correct. I had two pips, one with a very convincing start. But there was no further progress Tuesday morning and when the spouse asked I told him that I thought they hadn't made it. But we didn't have any time to do any checking since he had to go to work and I had a full day of welding practice in front of me. Off we went and I was very glad the kids would be at Grandma's while I took care of the aftermath of this particular folly.
We got back that afternoon and naturally I made a beeline for the incubator. Wait a sec...one beak...two...hey, there's another one...Honey, they
ALL HATCHED.
Five little peepers. Five gorgeous little buckeyes. Two of them have the red-tipped beaks that I like, a couple have chipmunk markings, one is decidedly blond and there a couple of very red fuzzies. All bright and energetic as anything. My husband thinks I'm going back to work because we need to kill off some debt and so we can afford a few extras for our offspring and he's right, mostly. I'm also going back to work so I can afford to get a place that will let me have more Buckeyes
.
