Day two (Aug 7) for broody hen on 14 eggs

[mychoock]

Yes, I did candle them, but saw no development. I finally cracked open the eggs yesterday to see if they were infertile or fertile but arrested development. One was quite nasty with bacterial grow. The other six were either infertile or fertile but no development past day 2 or 3. I don't think my makeshift incubator is consistent enough to provide good hatching results. So I will be constructing one using designs of BYCers.
I hope you have great success with your broody!

I am sorry that your eggs never had the chance to become little chicks. Hope you have better luck next time, either with a hen or with an incubator.

I am on Day 22 now, although it could possibly be Day 21 because I don't know if you count the day on which the eggs get placed under the hen. If there is no action by this evening we will look under the hen and see if there is anything happening. We haven't candled the eggs, but I see that it could be very helpful in knowing what to expect, or possibly sorting out infertile eggs. Next time we will do that.

My hen seems to be holding out okay. She gets off briefly almost every day to eat, and has made four huge stinky poops during the 21 days.

 

[epignosisjs]

Glad to hear your girl has followed through. I hope things go well!

 

[mychoock]

I feel like I have dropped off the end of the earth, as far as posting on this thread.

I have no chicks. Not one. We did candle the eggs at the end, and thought we would give her another day. Finally, when nothing was happening, we took away all the eggs, even though some of them had looked promising when held over a flashlight.

And nothing. Not one egg was developing into anything. All duds.

I am mostly disappointed for the hen's sake. She did everything perfectly. But both my roosters have let me down, as it did not seem that any of those eggs was fertilized.

I guess my next step is to research roosters and see what to do next.

What a let down.