December hatch along

[Matieus27]

it would be nice to have local egg banks. Eggs will not store long but maybe we can brain storm an idea. Idea #1 those who participate in an egg bank can make a tax deductible contribution of eggs to a homeless shelter where eggs are kept a week (or however long is reasonable) The eggs will be marked with the breed. After a week the eggs go to feed the homeless or poor families. This way a flow of eggs are coming in and when someone locally wants a specific breed of hatching egg there is a chance that breed is available locally... OK I lack the resource to pull that off but I contributed the thought.

Hey all it takes is a good idea to make a great enterprise

 

[Compost King]

It takes people donating hatching eggs too and likely people will donate their lowest quality hatching eggs. However maybe if the people buying the eggs from such a bank 50% goes towards the charity and 50% goes to the donor. And allow people to put their brand (not a physical branding) on their hatching eggs to increase repeat customers. Eggs not sold can be charity write offs... Arranging this type of charity is way over my pay grade. Its just a thought to get eggs easily available locally. I would donate mine to such a deal. Its basically what I do now but with no sales lol. I give away my eggs to people who are squeezing budgets and could use a break on their grocery bill. I would like to start selling hatching eggs when I get enough of them coming in.

 

[Matieus27]

It takes people donating hatching eggs too and likely people will donate their lowest quality hatching eggs. However maybe if the people buying the eggs from such a bank 50% goes towards the charity and 50% goes to the donor. And allow people to put their brand (not a physical branding) on their hatching eggs to increase repeat customers. Eggs not sold can be charity write offs... Arranging this type of charity is way over my pay grade. Its just a thought to get eggs easily available locally. I would donate mine to such a deal. Its basically what I do now but with no sales lol. I give away my eggs to people who are squeezing budgets and could use a break on their grocery bill. I would like to start selling hatching eggs when I get enough of them coming in.

Selling hatching eggs and baby chicks is a goal of mine but that won’t happen till I get my breeder stock built up and get moved to some land where I can do that

 

[Compost King]

I make money on the plants I produce, which explains my screen name. Chickens were added to the nursery as scratching composters who leave nitrogen nuggets in the leaves they scratch up. I sell chickens that I do not breed at the point of lay to pay for feed. Its all one big elaborate plot to get out of paying for soil. However I want to start selling hatching eggs and chicks if there is a steady flow of income in it. For now Point of Lay chickens are the easiest to sell on craigslist and these birds are keeping me knee deep in compost which is in high demand for a nursery.

 

[mitziworm]

Figure as I'm following and hatching I might as well join in. Running a staggered hatch started last month. Have 2 Belgian D'uccle chicks from first batch of 44 eggs, 4 hatched 2 survived. Looking at temperature plus shipped eggs being the downfall. Last night I assisted a guinea fowl to hatch at 33 days, so quite overdue I actually went to take the eggs out at 31 days and found 1 had pipped so quickly put eggs back and watched. Candled last night and saw that the pip was a bit below the air sac so I decided to intervene. Took my time open a bit dampen put him back wait an hour check, repeated that for 6 hours until I thought he could finish it went to bed and got up 4 hours later hes out thrashing around with a wing stuck to his side, cleaned that up and hes doing ok. After the bad hatch in November I started collecting from my own chooks as well as guineas so have hatches due of guinea fowl on 18th and 21st and chickens on 27th. This year is my first go incubating with auto turners and humidity moniters so total learning curve. Have run the incubator at around 45-50% temp set at 37.5c but now raised that due to late hatches. Have a second bator set up for hatching 65% humidity but have struggled a bit keeping it steady with the first batch but getting better now. Sorry for the long post will try add picture of the gf keet hatched overnight. He was big and not positioned well. If anyone hatches guineas I'm wondering do they normally position same as chicks as this one didn't tuck in the same?

 

[Matieus27]

Figure as I'm following and hatching I might as well join in. Running a staggered hatch started last month. Have 2 Belgian D'uccle chicks from first batch of 44 eggs, 4 hatched 2 survived. Looking at temperature plus shipped eggs being the downfall. Last night I assisted a guinea fowl to hatch at 33 days, so quite overdue I actually went to take the eggs out at 31 days and found 1 had pipped so quickly put eggs back and watched. Candled last night and saw that the pip was a bit below the air sac so I decided to intervene. Took my time open a bit dampen put him back wait an hour check, repeated that for 6 hours until I thought he could finish it went to bed and got up 4 hours later hes out thrashing around with a wing stuck to his side, cleaned that up and hes doing ok. After the bad hatch in November I started collecting from my own chooks as well as guineas so have hatches due of guinea fowl on 18th and 21st and chickens on 27th. This year is my first go incubating with auto turners and humidity moniters so total learning curve. Have run the incubator at around 45-50% temp set at 37.5c but now raised that due to late hatches. Have a second bator set up for hatching 65% humidity but have struggled a bit keeping it steady with the first batch but getting better now. Sorry for the long post will try add picture of the gf keet hatched overnight. He was big and not positioned well. If anyone hatches guineas I'm wondering do they normally position same as chicks as this one didn't tuck in the same?

What cute little guy

 

[mitziworm]

What cute little guy

Thank you. Love the guinea keets

 

[mandelyn]

Localized egg banks would be a neat idea!

Couldn't stand it anymore and candled! Day 7, was trying to hold out till Sunday since half of them are super dark.

I could see the dot swimming in all of the dark ones! 5 of 5 Turkeys looking good, 3 of 3 OE, 4 of 4 EE, 11 of 12 Marans (1 was iffy, could turn out to be a bloodring) and 13 of 16 Bresse, 3 were clear. Considering egg shape/size and similarities in the shell, seems to be from one Bresse hen in particular. Might need to do a test in that flock of who's laying what if that continues. (Legbands and Lipstick solve that! Assign a lipstick color to a legband color, and you can identify who within a group is laying what by putting the lipstick at the vent)

Hoarding some more Bresse and Olive Eggers for another setting.... (last one till February)

The new equipment is running true and there is already a huge difference over last year! I had to toss roughly 30%-40% at day 10 for being clear or with bloodrings.

I've also been storing them in a turner, that's a new thing I'm doing too.

 

[Compost King]

I just candled, not that i needed to again but once a night helps to make time pass sooner. I like these monthly hatch a longs so I can see the baby pictures every time someone hatches, it helps with the waiting for mine to hatch... 10 days to go.

 

[Compost King]

Localized egg banks would be a neat idea!

Couldn't stand it anymore and candled! Day 7, was trying to hold out till Sunday since half of them are super dark.

I could see the dot swimming in all of the dark ones! 5 of 5 Turkeys looking good, 3 of 3 OE, 4 of 4 EE, 11 of 12 Marans (1 was iffy, could turn out to be a bloodring) and 13 of 16 Bresse, 3 were clear. Considering egg shape/size and similarities in the shell, seems to be from one Bresse hen in particular. Might need to do a test in that flock of who's laying what if that continues. (Legbands and Lipstick solve that! Assign a lipstick color to a legband color, and you can identify who within a group is laying what by putting the lipstick at the vent)

Hoarding some more Bresse and Olive Eggers for another setting.... (last one till February)

The new equipment is running true and there is already a huge difference over last year! I had to toss roughly 30%-40% at day 10 for being clear or with bloodrings.

I've also been storing them in a turner, that's a new thing I'm doing too.

For now its an idea, spread the idea. I like the idea of combining it with a charity because something needs to be done with eggs not sold. I wonder if everyone who donates eggs will need to be NPIP certified... projects like this need a great manager and the only thing I can manage is compost.