Day 18??

[big-island-chickens]

Hi...

So I started incubating 13 eggs on the 14th of this month at 11:30 am. Is today day 18 or tomorrow??
I'm thinking it's today at 11:30.

 

[rebelcowboysnb]

Tomorrow.

 

[big-island-chickens]

Wow.. thanks!

Tomorrow it is.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I'll see if I can make it easy. Many people get confused on this and I think the way we phrase it adds to the confusion.

An egg does not have 24 hours worth of development 2 seconds after it is put in the incubator. It takes 24 hours in the incubator before it has 24 hours (or one day) of development. To me it seems that Day 1 should be the day you put it in the incubator. This is not correct. I'd prefer it if we called it days of development instead of day whatever.

If you put your eggs in the incubator on Friday the 14th, it has a week or seven days of development Friday the 21st. It will have developed for 18 days on Tuesday, the first. They will have 21 days of decvelopment and should hatch on Friday February 4th. As a general rule, with chicken eggs, the day of the week you set them is the day of the week they should hatch, in your case Friday.

I don't see it as absolutely necessary that you go into lockdown dead on the correct hour on 18 days of development, but I think you should be as close as you reasonably can.

Hatch is supposed to be after 21 days of development, but it often is not. Different things can effect the exact hatch time, incubator temperature being the most important. if your average incubating temperature si a bit high, they can hatch early. If it is a bit low, they can hatch a little late. My incubator was a bit hot. I had one pipping when I went into lockdown at 18 days. That hatch was OK. It is not an exact science.

So, yes, it is tomorrow.

Good luck!!!

 

[big-island-chickens]

That clears it up! Thank you very much.

 

[Pascal PicklePants]

Quote:
I started my eggs the same day, so tomorrow is lock-down day for me too! It sure helps to know that someone else is pacing in front of their incubator just like me

 

[kjhowe77]

I go into lockdown tomorrow too! I can't wait for Friday!

 

[big-island-chickens]

Very cool! Good luck to both of you!

 

[daisychick]

The easy way for me to remember it is take the day you set them and add to that number. So in your case take 14 (day you set them) plus 18 (day you lockdown) and you get 32. 31 days in Jan. so it would be Feb.1st. I do that for the "due date" too. Take 14th and add 21 to it. That is the way I keep it straight.