Day 20...Six of Eight Hatched! Hatch Completed PIC

[speckledhen]

Right now, I have 11 chicks in the brooder and 2 still in the hatcher till they dry a bit more. There are 4 out in the nursery coop who are six weeks old now, after selling three of them.

 

[skeeter9]

Way to go, Cyn!!! I know what you mean about not getting the ones you really want to hatch!! I only had 3 Orps (1 blue and 2 black) hatch out of 12, but the Cuckoo Marans did great.

Congrats,
Lori

 

[speckledhen]

I was not happy about the Orp with its insides out at all. That's a first for me and the hatches have all been so clean and perfect that I can't imagine it was an incubation problem, but who knows?
The first shipment of eggs I ever received was only a half-dozen because Julie's girls quit laying, pretty much, when my collection days came up. Out of the six, I got five to hatch, but three were cockerels. The next batch was from a different breeder, 12 in all. After the first candling, when I removed two infertiles and one with a blood ring, I was left with 9, but alot of the shells were very porous. I got 2 out of that bunch, Skye and a Splash cockerel. So, it's been slow going, trying to fill out my breeding flock, very slow. I have one more Orp egg in the bator that will go in the hatcher on the 29th, then none till I begin collecting more later in December.
Yep, I can hatch my Ameraucanas and Barred Rocks all day long, but the Blue Orps are a bit more challenging.

 

[Farmer Kitty]

It's always the ones that you want the most you have trouble with. I've never hatched chicks but, we have the cows. We had bought in some blue holsteins and wanted more so we started breeding for them. We're down to one cow. Any that manage to be blue have been bulls. Just keep trying.

Congrats on the good hatch!

 

[speckledhen]

I've never heard of blue holsteins! I used to know more about cows, way more than I remember. My grandfather had a farm and we had Black Angus, Guernsey, Jersey, etc. No Holsteins that I recall, though. Didn't know they had blues!

 

[EweSheep]

I have to say the same thing for my Hamburgs.....sometimes I can not get them to hatch or they got innards sticking out or unabsourbed egg yolks. Those were th eones I wanted to hatch out badly!

My blue orps girls are not laying yet and none of them are talking about popping out eggs LOL! One Blue Rock's comb is getting very RED and I am expecting her to start laying or she is eating her own eggs! Gotta ask Santa for a roll away nest boxes! Once all of them get going on their laying, I will send them to Gordon, my roo for his "studly services" until my egg orders are completed for the year before I bring them back home again in the fall. IF they dont get killed by predators!

Cyn, I sure hope those Orps will hatch! Those eggs that we wanted to hatch so bad, they would do all kinds of mind games on us!

Farmer Kitty, if you can, submit a pic of Blue Hosteins...I would love to look at those! I have seen some Beltway cattle and they are something to see in the pasture!

 

[Katy]

I know what you mean Farmer Kitty. The cows that we wish would have heifers seem not to!! Ours are beef cattle tho...not dairy. My FIL had a small dairy when my husband was a kid and he got all he wanted of milking cows back then!!

 

[seminolewind]

Can someone explain "born with the inners out?"

 

[speckledhen]

A sac with all the intestines was on the outside of the body. Not a pretty sight. Much worse than unabsorbed yolk. And nothing it could recover from, either. Can't put 'em in.

 

[LoneCowboy]

So I read in one of my many books (I have to say that because I have no real experience of my own) That some breeds require a little different temp or humidity. Maybe you don't have the ideal set for Orps. Maybe you should play around with it a little and see what you get, or call some hatcheries and see if they have seen a difference.

This would be interesting research. Too bad I hate research.