First time candler has questions... Please help!

[curranchickens]

I set 26 Lavender Orpington eggs 6 days ago.... These are from my own pullets that just started laying three weeks before I started collecting eggs. This is my first hatch ever so I am looking at it as a learning experience with low expectations.

I have been candling a lot and here is what I have seen....

Day 3 - 2 are VERY pourous and it is nearly impossible to see inside... Some are clear some have a dark mass towards the fat end of the egg and are clear at the bottom pointed side....

Day 4 - 2 are VERY pourous and it is nearly impossible to see inside.... The clear are still clear and the rest have much larger then before dark masses towards the fat side....

Day 6 - 2 are VERY pourous and it is nearly impossible to see inside
1 has a very distint circular ring which I am reading might be a bacterial ring and I should throw the egg out
3 are clear and I have removed them...
2 of them still have a dark mass but I do not see much different from before
18 of them now have veining!!!!!

Problem is... The ones with veining do not look like all the pics I have been looking at. All the pics I have seen has the dark spot with the veining coming off of it in the center of the egg and the rest of the egg is mostly clear. My eggs have the dark spot with the veining coming off of it more at the top fat side of the egg and a dark band arou g the middle of the egg and clear at the pointy end of the egg. Is that dark band something to be concerned with? I am thinking it can not be that bad since there was no veining and now there is so they must be developing. Is it just because I am using an egg turner so the eggs are more upright then eggs hand turned?

I tried with all my. Ight to take decent pics but the eggs just would not show up in the pics... Too dark to really make out anything.

 

[curranchickens]

bump

 

[4-H chicken mom]

Without the pics it is really hard to say but as long as you think they are growing, I would let them be. I don't even bother with candeling until day 7. Wait to candle again around day 14, any eggs with a red line means they have died. If any eggs just don't look right and when you rock it back and forth and the yolk seems to just slosh around isn't a good thing either. By day 14 you will see movement in the egg, so all will be good. Good luck.

 

[redhen689]

Are you incubating pointy side down?
With dark eggs it is hard to candle so early.
A red ring around the circumfrence of the egg, means that embryo started to develop then died.
If you are not sure, just let them be and wait and see.
Try candleing with a brighter light in a darker room.

 

[curranchickens]

Are you incubating pointy side down?
With dark eggs it is hard to candle so early.
A red ring around the circumfrence of the egg, means that embryo started to develop then died.
If you are not sure, just let them be and wait and see.
Try candleing with a brighter light in a darker room.

Yes! Incubating in an egg turner with pointed side down. I am on top of it! I have been researching flashlights and learned all about lumens... I was using a little led light that came three in a pack for like 5 dollars at Walgreens... I went to home depot and got a 208 lumens flashlight form 39 dollars! When I came back home, I pointed it at the wall and it was amazing... The light I was using did not even show up on the wll and you could not tell it was on. I can not wait till tonight... I live in the woods so at night, it is pitch black here. My main question concern was that the veins seemed as if they were all up top and all the pictures I have seen have the veins in the middle.

 

[roosterjrm]

sounds like most of your eggs were fertile, I know one thing I sure wished I had some Blue Lavender Orp.

 

[curranchickens]

You want lavender orps? or blue / black /splash orps?

I actually have both... I have 7 lavender girls with one lavender cockerel and then I have two splash girls with a black cockerel and a blue cockerel.

The genetic outcome of the blue orps is always a combination of blue black and splash but the lavenders have to be separate and the breed true so outcome is only lavenders

 

[DirtCreature]

I DO! LOL, im hatching lavender orps right now, but would LOVE to have blue! LOL

You want lavender orps? or blue / black /splash orps?
I actually have both... I have 7 lavender girls with one lavender cockerel and then I have two splash girls with a black cockerel and a blue cockerel.
The genetic outcome of the blue orps is always a combination of blue black and splash but the lavenders have to be separate and the breed true so outcome is only lavenders

 

[TarheelBirdy]

I try not to candle until day 10 is complete. The way I look at it.....anything I candle before that is going back into the bator "just in case," so I just leave it alone.