I'v never kept chickens before so i have no idea what i am doing! Any tips and advice much appreciated
So here's my situation:
I bought 10 fertilized eggs from the farmers market on impulse! Completely unprepared which is highly irresponsible, i know, but i got talking to the guy and ended up coming home with eggs to care for! We've been planning for years to get chickens, we've got a shed and a fenced off area all ready for them and we've planted lots of corn and sunflower this year for feed so it was just a matter of getting the actual chickens. When i was speaking to the guy with the eggs they were so cheap i though why not give it a try! Then instantly afterwards i started panicking because i don't have an incubator and i don't know what i'm doing!
When i got home with the eggs they were cold and i thought that was bad so i put them in an egg box on top of a hot water bottle to warm them up while i googled how to make an incubator. I since read that they are supposed to be kept at room temperature before they go into the incubator, so i think i did that wrong. Do you think they will be dead either because they were cold when i bought them or because i warmed them up before incubating them?
I don't have an incubator but i have an old cupboard with a glass door which i thought would be ok. I sellotaped a light inside as well as a digital thermometer. I put the eggs in a shoe box with an old towel and positioned it under the light and put the sensor for the thermometer on top of the eggs. At first the light was too far away and the temperature was reading around 33 c over night. I thought it would heat up more and was worried about the light over heating and causing a fire so i slept in the same room and was getting up to check on it throughout the night. In the morning i re positioned the light closer to the eggs and it's now staying between 37-39 C. This is now the 3rd day and i am able to keep the temperature pretty constant by opening or closing the door very slightly if it goes up too high or down too low. I also have a dish of water inside for humidity but i don't have a humidity reader.
Is this set up adequate? I will attach a picture.
Do you think the eggs will hatch like this? Or maybe my inexperience and complete lack of knowledge has killed them? I hope not! I am also turning them several times day and night and constantly monitoring the temperature. last night it was holding at 37.7 C, then i opened the door to turn them this morning and the temp dropped but it went back up and now it's holding spot on 38 C I really hope they survive!



So here's my situation:
I bought 10 fertilized eggs from the farmers market on impulse! Completely unprepared which is highly irresponsible, i know, but i got talking to the guy and ended up coming home with eggs to care for! We've been planning for years to get chickens, we've got a shed and a fenced off area all ready for them and we've planted lots of corn and sunflower this year for feed so it was just a matter of getting the actual chickens. When i was speaking to the guy with the eggs they were so cheap i though why not give it a try! Then instantly afterwards i started panicking because i don't have an incubator and i don't know what i'm doing!
When i got home with the eggs they were cold and i thought that was bad so i put them in an egg box on top of a hot water bottle to warm them up while i googled how to make an incubator. I since read that they are supposed to be kept at room temperature before they go into the incubator, so i think i did that wrong. Do you think they will be dead either because they were cold when i bought them or because i warmed them up before incubating them?
I don't have an incubator but i have an old cupboard with a glass door which i thought would be ok. I sellotaped a light inside as well as a digital thermometer. I put the eggs in a shoe box with an old towel and positioned it under the light and put the sensor for the thermometer on top of the eggs. At first the light was too far away and the temperature was reading around 33 c over night. I thought it would heat up more and was worried about the light over heating and causing a fire so i slept in the same room and was getting up to check on it throughout the night. In the morning i re positioned the light closer to the eggs and it's now staying between 37-39 C. This is now the 3rd day and i am able to keep the temperature pretty constant by opening or closing the door very slightly if it goes up too high or down too low. I also have a dish of water inside for humidity but i don't have a humidity reader.
Is this set up adequate? I will attach a picture.
Do you think the eggs will hatch like this? Or maybe my inexperience and complete lack of knowledge has killed them? I hope not! I am also turning them several times day and night and constantly monitoring the temperature. last night it was holding at 37.7 C, then i opened the door to turn them this morning and the temp dropped but it went back up and now it's holding spot on 38 C I really hope they survive!
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