Candling frequency

[Donette]

I’ve read you should not candle your eggs more than 2 or 3 times during incubation as it reduces viability, but doesn’t the mama bird get off the eggs on occasion and go eat? What’s the difference between her getting off the eggs for a few and me taking the lid off the incubator for a few? (Serious question)

 

[nuthatched]

You can candle once a day or not at all, as long as you're careful, it doesn't really matter.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I’ve read you should not candle your eggs more than 2 or 3 times during incubation as it reduces viability, but doesn’t the mama bird get off the eggs on occasion and go eat? What’s the difference between her getting off the eggs for a few and me taking the lid off the incubator for a few? (Serious question)

You can read all kinds of strange things on this forum or elsewhere. As long as your hands and equipment are clean so you don't introduce bacteria to the eggs and you are careful to not drop them and crack the eggshell you can candle them daily. The interior of the egg where the embryo is cools off pretty slowly. As long as you don't get ridiculous on how long they are out of the incubator it will not affect anything.

 

[JosieMaeChickens]

It’s fine, like you said the hen gets off of them as well. Personally I only candle at day 10 to check if they are fertile then again at day 18 to see if they developed.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

I candle once, maybe twice. At 10 days to pull duds and check air cell then might candle again day 18.

 

[Blue is my chicken]

I know that you aren't hand rolling but I have to hand roll and I candle every time I roll them, which is 5 times a day and i have had no problems when doing this so don't worry about candling too many times
Good luck with your hatch

 

[NorthwoodsChick]

I am incubating dark colored eggs and marking air cells. Am candling before setting, day 7, 14, 18. At day 7 making note of which bear watching and recandle those at day 12 if needed.
I just candled Marans and MarsBar today (d14) and am stumped on one. No smell so in it stays. Another one fooled me on day 12 but today it’s unchanged. I removed and opened and it quit really early- no arm buds.
Dark eggs are so hard to see

 

[CHICKENX2005]

And blue eggs they are some of if not the hardest ones to candle

 

[CHICKENX2005]

I know that with goose eggs your actually are supposed to take them out for a certain amount of time and let them cool and then you wet them with a sprayer and put them back in the incubator. I'm not sure about chicken eggs. I always thought that the reason why you don't want to candle the eggs to much was just because you could be exposing them to bacteria and not so much because of them being cooled a little.

 

[CHICKENX2005]

Although under a hen it's not like they are in a sanitary environment so.. I think that at least from what I remember roosters when in the egg are more sensitive to cold temperatures so if the eggs get cold it could kill the eggs that are going to be roosters. So if that's true than that would explain why when hens hatch eggs they often lose some before they hatch but the ones that do hatch are usually hens. Because some times the hen probably let's the eggs cool to much and it kills a lot of the cockerels in the eggs. This can also happen in an incubator if the eggs got to cold. This happened to me a couple of times. This can be beneficial depending on your reasons for hatching chicks.