Egg carton natching? good? bad? hard? easy?

[dwegg]

Who has used egg cartons to hatch before?

I was thinking of trying it with my silkie eggs going in lockdown tomorrow. Would like to hear people's experience with using egg cartons. Any tricks I should be aware of?

This is what I made today...will it work?
From this....

to this...

 

[maybejoey]

I have tried it but not good results. But i have never gotten more than 2 chicks each time.

 

[CarolJ]

I just put mine in lockdown yesterday morning - in cardboard egg cartons. I cut the lids off the cartons and left empty pocket/spaces between eggs. So far, seven have hatched and they're climbing all over the cartons and eggs that haven't hatched. They like to rest in the empty pockets. It's really cute - and they are doing great!

Just took some pics of the babies in the egg cartons so you could see how I did it. A friend of mine hatches in egg cartons and recommended it for me. Even though the newly hatched chicks climb all over the unhatched eggs, they can't really disturb them much. They're so cute!

 

[dwegg]

did your eggs go straight up and down like in the egg turner or did you lean them to one side so they were tilted...more flat then up and down? I have 16 eggs so only the middle pocket will be empty...

 

[rebel yell]

Stand them stright up with pointy end down like normal, dont lean them, I always use paper cartons.

 

[LilyD]

I have done this with both paper and styrafoam and had okay results. I hatched out 14 using this during my last hatch but then had 2 die from severe leg problems a little later on. at the time I wondered if it might not have been caused by hopping down from the cartons on to the floor but I will never know for sure.

 

[CarolJ]

Quote:
I removed one of the egg cartons when I realized they didn't have a flat area to walk on. There were still two unhatched eggs in that carton - so I quickly moved them to empty pockets in another carton. All done within a few seconds - no loss of heat or humidity - I kept an eye on the temp/humidity monitor. Whew! Now they are still climbing over the egg cartons and unhatched eggs - but they're also resting on the flat area at times. This is the first time I've ever hatched eggs, and I'm beyond thrilled that I have 7 chicks already hatched - and the 8th one is almost finished zipping. Next time, I will plan for a flat area from the beginning of lockdown. The egg cartons are working well for me so far.