First time incubation questions

[DawnM]

My daughter is using her new Hova-bator 1602-N to do her school science project. She got 24 eggs from a local seller and put them in the bator on January 1st. They were all laid either on the 31st of Dec. or the 1st of January. She split them down the middle and washed 12 of them, her experiment is based on whether washed or unwashed eggs will have a better hatch rate. We have not had any luck trying to candle them so I was wondering how long it takes for the eggs that were no good to start smelling or showing somehow that they are bad. It's been 9 days now and none of them are showing any signs that something is not right.

Also I think I might have to go out and buy a good flashlight for candling. We have tried using regular lightbulbs over hoods and camping flashlights with cardboard on top of both and nothing seems to show anything. Is there a brand of flashlight that works best? The incubator so far has worked like a dream, holding the right temperature and humidity and she is religous about turnin the eggs so hopefully we are doing everything right.

 

[Higins00]

You can start to see veins on day 3. I use a small Mag lite the kind with one bulb. Candle at night in the dark. Good luck

 

[trunkman]

Go to home depot and buy one of those small LED flashlight that takes AA batteries, that's what I use and you can see veins and embryos with it, regular flashlights I think aren't strong enough to candle.

I was amazed the first time I used this small flashlight in my backyard at night, it lit up the woods in my back yard at 150 feet away, something that my large maglite can't do...

 

[Hottchick]

My son is waiting on shipped eggs for a science fair project too! We're going with refrigerated vs. non-refrigerated before going into the incubator for hatch rate.

 

[DawnM]

Quote:
I'll let you know how hers turns out, the more experiments like these the better her hatching rates will get.

I went and got a small led flashlight and still no luck. I can't even see through the shell, it's just orange glow. Must be a talent I don't have. Some of the eggs are really dark because the mom's were Marans but some are almost white. Can't even figure out how to do the white ones. I know what I'm looking for because I have seen pics on BackyardChickens and other sites but I just don't see anything. Guess we'll have to wait and see.