First time hatching

[LMVB]

Any one let the hen hatch the eggs? I do not want to go thru raising a flock of chicks again! I would like a mama chicken do that work! Advice?

 

[WVduckchick]

Any one let the hen hatch the eggs? I do not want to go thru raising a flock of chicks again! I would like a mama chicken do that work! Advice?

Got any broody breeds? Give her some eggs. She takes care of the rest!

 

[oregonkat]

Since we homeschool my 16 yr old daughter, EVERYTHING is a learning experiance!! With our first candling there were 11 duck eggs non fertile and we had a chicken bloodring and a quitter. So she cracked everyone of the eggs!! All 11 were as suspected non fertile. The bloodring had the thick blood vessel but nothing much more visable. The last quitter egg had an embryo in it and was very neat seeing in person what they actually look like!!


So at hatch when we had 4 that didnt hatch, we went ahead and opened to see why or when they died.
#1 had made it to the internal pip but that was it. It still had a nice size yolk sack on it.
#2 & 3 both did not make it to the internal pip and had huge yolk sacks. They were fully formed just had the big yolk sack.
#4 sadly was breech and so twisted around itself it would have NEVER been able to reach to pip anywhere. It also had a nice size yolk sack.
It was sad BUT she wanted to do it! To learn and see what went wrong. #4 was def not an error on our part and was a good learning that sometimes even in humans babies get twisted and stuck.
We are on our second incubation..this time with 2 incubators! 1 has our eggs in it and the other has eggs from friends!! Last night was 1st candling and in our eggs we had 5 infertile and 1 bloodring. Whittney pointed the bloodring out before I did. Lol hands on learning is the best way to go!! In our friends eggs we had 5 nonfertile and a ? That we will give until day 14. She was excited to crack the eggs to "make sure" they were infertile and of course she was spot on about the bloodring!!

Is it possible that your humidity was too high? I was wondering this because the yolk sacs were so big? First time hatcher here at beginning incubation period and using the dry hatch method as I am hatching BCM and Isbar eggs. So glad for all the info available here.

 

[LMVB]

As far as breeds, I have 1 female Astrolorp, 2 Plymouth Barr Rocks, and 2 Easter Eggers. The Astrolorp did get broody last fall, but I wonder if I just leave some eggs in the nesting box (separated from the rest of the flock), will she turn broody, or do we have to wait until she goes into it herself??

 

[sccoterny]

Just an update, its been crazy, my 4 little ones are doing awsome, my pullets 8 of them, just started laying, and i got everyone i know hooked on brown eggs so they are moving fast.

So i have the incubator full and im giving it another shot. Going dry this time and the humidity is staying about 25%. I have 15 days left so i will candle on monday. Vacation in a couple of weeks so im turning the other shed, 14x20 into another walk in coop. The current one is the same size and they have about a 4500 sq. Ft run outside for 34 chickens. I might shrink that run just a little to make a fair sized run off the other coop.

 

[gimmie birdies]

Sounds like you have a good sized run. This is an over view of our chicken run and chicken house it is on less than a 1/4 acre, we have about 2 acres total.

 

[LMVB]

No replies???

 

[jurrasiccluck]

I don't know the measures of my coop. But I know its big enough for about 35 birds full grown and the chick I posted at the top was my first hatch. She follows me a lot and is now 3 and 1/2 weeks old, and because it was my first i named her eggly.

 

[sccoterny]

Sounds like you have a good sized run. This is an over view of our chicken run and chicken house it is on less than a 1/4 acre, we have about 2 acres total.

Cool view, i have about a half acre of woods too, pretty thin so this summer im gonna work on some clearing and try to open up more space.

 

[sccoterny]

I don't know the measures of my coop. But I know its big enough for about 35 birds full grown and the chick I posted at the top was my first hatch. She follows me a lot and is now 3 and 1/2 weeks old, and because it was my first i named her eggly.

Cute, mine are 2 weeks tomorrow and growing fast. Started getting some color in their wings and tails. 2 redish, one getting black on the wings, and one still all yellow. Im thinking shes gonna be white like her daddy.