Filling the incubator 6-3-2011 Join me for my 1st attempt?

[lebentier]

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Give the possible quitters a little longer; sometimes you'll have eggs that aren't developing as fast as the others due to cool spots in the incubator. If you see a big gas bubble rolling around loose in there, that can be a sign of a dead egg that wants to explode; you can float-test these eggs and if they float really high, you may want to toss them. If there's no gas bubble, then there's no real harm in leaving questionable eggs in the incubator. At this point in candling, you may only see a big dark mass; take that as a good sign, because it often means the embryo is getting bigger and taking up most of the space. When I do my pre-lockdown candling, I'll be looking for that; if I see any that look less "full" than the others, then I'll mark them as questionable. It can be really hard to tell the quitters during this last week! I have had eggs hatch that I didn't expect to. Sometimes when candling I can see the movement and I know I'm OK; other times I just cross my fingers. Good luck!

thanks. i will leave them alone and candle/float test at lockdown.

 

[kraftyladies]

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Same here!

 

[floridachickhatcher]

yeah im candling mine Saturday night and Sunday night i have 2 days worth of eggs in the bator and then lockdown is Sunday and Monday ^_^

 

[LilyD]

I couldn't help myself I candled again using Stitch's method of candling from the end rather than the side. Today is day 16 and I finally saw two of my green eggs move. The third I can't even see an air cell in. I could see movement in two of my barn mix eggs the third was too dark all I could see was the air cell but I think it looked normal. My BO eggs I could see two moving the third I couldn't see anything but the air cell I guess from now on I am probably not going to be able to candle since they are starting to fill the whole egg. Day 18 and lockdown are on Saturday night so we will see who hatches. So far 9 of 12 eggs are viable and it seems that all of my mail order shipped eggs are viable. Lost one barn mix to blood ring and two never developed at all. Seems funny that the eggs I picked up are doing worse than the shipped eggs.

 

[hudsonnascarfan]

i got a later start i didnt get mine in till saterday night so my lockdown wont be till wed night or thursday morning but my wife helped me candle all of the eggs tonight and looks good for 12 of them one we could only see the aircell in the rest of that egg was to dark we have 11 eggs that are still looking clear or have blood rings in them im going to give them till saterday and check them ones again if they are still the same i will pull them out then

 

[Taylorhens]

Ugh. Had my first "eggmergency" last night. I had noticed a slight smell coming from the bator. So though I was going to wait until day 14 to candle again, I went ahead and opened her up and started checking eggs. I immediately saw one of my Marans eggs had cracked and was leaking a little bit of smelly gunk.

I tried to pick it up, but it was stuck to the egg turner cup by the gunk. I tried to very gently pry it out and it just smooshed in my hand. Green junk spilled down into the bottom of the bator and a couple of tiny splatters got on 2 other eggs.

I quickly got a paper towel and wiped up the other eggs that got messed since I've heard you shouldn't wash them.

I moved the other eggs nearby away from the bad egg and took the whole line/rack out of the egg turner and set it aside to clean.

Then I took the whole egg turner out of the bator and took out the bottom liner (thank goodness I had the plastic liner in). I washed the plastic liner real well and then put it back in, put egg turner back in, but left out the stinky rack. Since I threw out a number of my cochin eggs I had enough spaces in the turner without that one rack.

Geez, I hope the bacteria won't ruin the whole hatch! My 3 remaining cochin eggs are still looking good, and none of the other Marans seemed to be having a problem.

Back to sitting on my hands until lockdown Tuesday.

 

[ItsAZOO32]

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I am SO glad you got to it before to exploded!! I guess breaking in one place is MUCH better then flinging grossness everywhere.. SO glad you found it!

 

[stitch81]

I grabbed an egg at random to check development and found a quitter. So I candled the others. There were a total of 2 quitters, probably yesterday. So we are down to 22 eggs out of our original 26. 2 Barred Rocks, 1 Welsummer, and 1 Buff orpington have quit thus far. Lockdown is monday morning.

 

[kraftyladies]

I alos am down to 22. 1 BBSO that I broke by accident, 1 LO that quit day 3 or so...and 1 BBSO and 1 LO that either were not fertile, or got scrambled by PO. There are a few that are questionable, but are dark and have some developmet, and didn't think I saw blood rings...so hoping for the best. Some were very active movers, no guessing there!

I will probably candle one more time Monday nite before I put them on lockdown Tuesday.....

It's getting close guys!!!

 

[stitch81]

I get a double dose of bator watching. We've got duck eggs that will be hatching this weekend (momma duck got killed and we took the eggs and put them in the hatcher, today is day 27? It looks like one is trying to pip into the air cell). I'm going to have to build a second hatcher, as I don't think they will be done in time for me to put the chicken eggs in on Monday. Since these duck eggs were from the wild and hadn't been cleaned off, I don't want to risk my chicks getting sick from them. Best to have a second hatcher.