Dumb question

[Bookspryte]

I'm in the process of winnowing down my barnyard mix chickens and hope to start to breed pure chickens later this year. I understand that part of selecting good breeding stock is knowing which rooster and which hen are responsible for each egg.

I totally get the need to mark the eggs. But once they start hatching, how do you keep track of chick came out of which egg? Or do you only incubate the eggs from one rooster/hen combination at a time.

There's probably a very simple answer, which is why it escapes me.

Denise

 

[LarryPQ]

Buy some leg bands from the feed store or ebay.

I usually know who came from who though....

 

[rebelcowboysnb]

At hatch time you put the eggs in baskets grouped by parents.

 

[LarryPQ]

ooh good call! I wasn't thinking about hatch time. I tend to stand obsessively over the bator when they are coming out...

 

[Bookspryte]

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I knew there had to be a perfectly logical and simple way to do it. Of course, if it had involved something totally convoluted, I'd have figured it out. Thanks, rebelcowboysnb. Again.

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I do too, then they all move around and I can't tell them apart. It doesn't help that most of them are all the same color.

Denise

 

[Hangin Wit My Peeps]

You could possibly put a little food coloring on their head...or I would go with the leg bands so you don't have to keep replacing the food coloring.

 

[Junkmanme]

Just give them each a name when they hatch....and then when you want a particular chick, you can just "call out the name".

(Just Kidding !!!)

The "food coloring" idea seems good IF you have enough colors for the different varieties. QUICK and EASY.

-Junkmanme-

 

[Bookspryte]

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That actually works with my older birds.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The way they scoot around, unless they are totaly different colors which you can tell apart at hatch, I cannot imagine how anyone can stay at the hatcher for the normal two days or so for a hatch to be complete and keep up with each individual chick until the last one hatches, especially if you have 30 or 40 eggs in the incubator.

Like Rebelcowboysnb said, you can put the eggs in baskets by parents or turn the baskets over the eggs so they cannot jump out and mix. Depends on your incubator/hatcher and how big the baskets are.

When you are hatching, your turner is probably out of the way. You could probably set up some type of fence between the different groups of eggs, say something made out of hardware cloth, to keep the chicks from mixing until the hatch is over and you can safely open the hatcher. Something to physically separate them until the hatch is complete is the only thing I can think of. I would want something wire or at least something that allowed good exchange of air. I'd be afraid they would suffocate if you tried something solid like a shoe box.

After you can safely open the hatcher, then you obviously have many different options for marking or separating them, but I think you knew that.