BYC's 4th of July Star Spangled Hatch-Along

[muddy75]

11 days left

 

[SourRoses]

Out of the 54 eggs we set, only 14 developed. All are from 3 hens, meaning Mr. Rooster is being a picky butt!
One of the moms is our smallest, laying medium. And one the biggest, laying jumbo. I like candling one of the jumbo cream colored eggs for people to see, it's particularly clear and the embryo seems especially bouncy Maybe I should make a video of her.

 

[LydiaB]

Out of the 54 eggs we set, only 14 developed. All are from 3 hens, meaning Mr. Rooster is being a picky butt!
One of the moms is our smallest, laying medium. And one the biggest, laying jumbo. I like candling one of the jumbo cream colored eggs for people to see, it's particularly clear and the embryo seems especially bouncy Maybe I should make a video of her.

You sure it’s a picky rooster not just eggs too old to work well?

Candling is super cool. I didn’t realize how addicting and educational incubating eggs is. My sister is always asking to “see the ducklings”

 

[SourRoses]

You sure it’s a picky rooster not just eggs too old to work well?

Candling is super cool. I didn’t realize how addicting and educational incubating eggs is. My sister is always asking to “see the ducklings”

Yes, I'm sure. Collection was from 8 hens, only eggs from 3 started to develop.
We tend our hatching eggs carefully so I've gotten good results even when the eggs are a bit older.

This roo has a lot of good traits for my project, but he took so long to grow up enough to start breeding that I missed the whole spring of hatching! And he's not the most prolific breeder. His grandsire that gave him the sweet personality was a much better breeder. So I will definitely be picking a replacement rooster from the chicks I get this year. We've 13 chicks on the ground with broodies from the start of this month, and the 14 developing in the incubator. I'm collecting more eggs and will have another go after this hatch, unless a convenient broody pops up meanwhile

Candling is fun when it's easy to see! I have trouble often with even just the blue eggs... I usually wait until day 7 to decide if they're developing or not, I don't have the heart to risk being wrong sooner!

 

[LaurenRitz]

I usually wait until day 7 to decide if they're developing or not, I don't have the heart to risk being wrong sooner!

I separate anything that looks questionable and candle again after 3 days.

 

[LydiaB]

Yes, I'm sure. Collection was from 8 hens, only eggs from 3 started to develop.
We tend our hatching eggs carefully so I've gotten good results even when the eggs are a bit older.

This roo has a lot of good traits for my project, but he took so long to grow up enough to start breeding that I missed the whole spring of hatching! And he's not the most prolific breeder. His grandsire that gave him the sweet personality was a much better breeder. So I will definitely be picking a replacement rooster from the chicks I get this year. We've 13 chicks on the ground with broodies from the start of this month, and the 14 developing in the incubator. I'm collecting more eggs and will have another go after this hatch, unless a convenient broody pops up meanwhile

Candling is fun when it's easy to see! I have trouble often with even just the blue eggs... I usually wait until day 7 to decide if they're developing or not, I don't have the heart to risk being wrong sooner!

Oh! I misunderstood. Thought you meant you had 54 eggs from only 3 hens. Oops.

So this is my first hatch with chicken eggs- some of the shells are more porous and I’m having trouble seeing through them- not sure if that’s lack of development or me not being used to chicken eggs. All the eggs I’m hatching are white to medium brown. So I left all of them and will check again by the end of the week to see what happens.

 

[LydiaB]

I separate anything that looks questionable and candle again after 3 days.

I marked mine with pencil. Check mark if I saw veins, question if I didn’t. I checked on day 7 for the chickens and day 14 for the ducks. The ducks were the second candling. So far 21 ducklings are moving around in the eggs and 12 chicken eggs have good veins. Which leaves 9 chickens as ?

 

[SourRoses]

So this is my first hatch with chicken eggs- some of the shells are more porous and I’m having trouble seeing through them- not sure if that’s lack of development or me not being used to chicken eggs. All the eggs I’m hatching are white to medium brown. So I left all of them and will check again by the end of the week to see what happens.

The porous ones are from a lack of calcium, or age of the hen. Are they from your own flock or did you get them elsewhere?
It doesn't seem to affect the chicks, but sure makes it harder to see! I have an older hen that lays really porous. She does better when I put out layer feed (separate feeder) while all the younger ones do fine on grower + oyster shell.
Usually around 14 days or so I can see if anything is developing in the porous ones because of the dark shadow filling up the egg... but those brown eggs of yours may be impossible! lol

 

[LydiaB]

The porous ones are from a lack of calcium, or age of the hen. Are they from your own flock or did you get them elsewhere?
It doesn't seem to affect the chicks, but sure makes it harder to see! I have an older hen that lays really porous. She does better when I put out layer feed (separate feeder) while all the younger ones do fine on grower + oyster shell.
Usually around 14 days or so I can see if anything is developing in the porous ones because of the dark shadow filling up the egg... but those brown eggs of yours may be impossible! lol

They are purchased eggs. Delaware broilers. I’m disappointed in the egg quality to be honest. Next year I plan to hatch only home eggs, I’m just hatching breeds that are hard to fine hatched. We supplement oyster shells here and have excellent quality shells on our eggs.

 

[MountainWoman73]

I had a rough time candling today. I set 16 eggs and candled on days 6, 11, and 17. On day 11 we took out 3 clears and 1 early quitter (looked like it died on day 5), and put question marks on two. So we had 12 left, 10 that looked really good, and 2 that were definitely moving. Today (day 17), only 4 looked good to me. No movements observed. 6 are question marks because they either looked full but a little bit sloshy, or just not quite full enough for day 17. I kept those in, and threw out my two question marks from before because they had definitely quit halfway through.

These were mostly shipped eggs, with a couple locals in there. The incubator has been set at 100.5 and 50 percent humidity, but according to my cheap Amazon hygrometers it's been closer to 100.8 and 42 percent. The incubator was used 2 months ago by my friend and they had 11/13 hatch.

I'm feeling discouraged and worried that they all died. And I have to wait 4 days to find out. I'd love some moral support.