Five Tough Chicks and TWO Amazing Embryos!

[WVduckchick]

@WVduckchick The eggs I'm stressing over now were 14 days old when set. I think they're the oldest I've tried so far. Usually with anything over 10 days old I get mixed results. Some never develop at all, some hatch on time with no problem, some are late, some need assistance at hatch but grow out just fine. They're def more likely to be trouble makers when compared to fresh eggs. I like a challenge.....sometimes.

yep, i definitely prefer fresh eggs, but i had room and wasn't going to use those eggs otherwise so didn't have anything to lose. But i agree, you never know what you'll get really.

 

[Peeps61]

Ummm.... NO! I guess if you were Filipino and developed a taste for Balut, then great. But for this American girl? NO WAY! I've lived in the Philippines for 6 1/2 years, seen Balut many times and NEVER wanted to try it. Yuck! I like my eggs undeveloped and fresh!

 

[Wickedchicken6]

They look kind of like Ameraucana chicks. Super cute!

Lol...they do have the appearance of the Ameraucana/EE look!
Welsummers also look quite similar. There are likely others. I find that so interesting!

2016 BYC New Years HAL...EEs and OEGBs. The OEGB are silver duck wing so they look more silver. But indeed, very close...lol.

 

[Wickedchicken6]

Popcorn for everyone!

The coolest eggs I ever hatched and candled were Polish! Clear as a bell, this is my favorite candling photo I've ever taken
View attachment 1059392

And watching them zip was cool too, because they cut a wide zip and I could actually watch them turn before each smack of the shell.

My duck eggs are usually pretty clear to candle also!

But back to the subject of crazy eggs... I have lavender orpingtons at my farm about an hour from my house. I've had a crazy broody for a while, she steals eggs and moves from nest to nest. But I wanted to incubate some eggs, so I wasn't sure if any of the ones I brought home had been sat on or not (I can't separate her, long story). I set some the evening of June 9th, a Friday. Got home from work yesterday (Wednesday) and already had a pip, and it hatched a few hours later. So apparently she had "pre-heated" that one!

Also, same hen had been sitting on eggs for 3 weeks. When I checked on her, she had killed 3 hatchlings. So I took the remaining 4 eggs, travelled an hour home with them, candled and 1 had an internal pip, 1 had previously quit, 2 looked to be a few days behind, but still good development. I put the 3 good ones in the incubator and they all hatched!

Now that's an amazing egg to see! Wow! That would be the perfect egg for a teacher to candle for a class! Or any of us who love candling eggs. (guilty here)

I am loving hearing about everyone's tough eggs/embryos!
That's incredible that you travelled an hour with them!
How did you package them for travel?

 

[Wickedchicken6]

Nice pic @WVduckchick

Also, glad to hear that duck eggs are pretty clear. I've been dying to try hatching some Pekin eggs. Incubating ducks is totally intimidating. I don't know why. I guess I got my chicken incubation process streamlined, so it'll be a lot like starting over completely to figure out how to hatch ducks with the same success. Perhaps I'm overthinking. LOL.

All the chicken breeds I have lay cream, brown, blue, and green eggs. Those big white eggs were stunning. A breeder gave them to me when I purchased more Bielefelder eggs. They're from an Ancona hen and a Whiting True Blue rooster. I guess I'll have light blue eggs to look forward to from those babies. I'm seriously reconsidering how I feel about white eggs though.

We sell a lot of eggs and y'all know how folks are. If they're buying eggs that AREN'T from the store, they want the "better tasting" brown ones....or the pretty blue and green ones. Around here, white eggs = grocery store eggs, and all other egg colors = delicious farm eggs. We all know that home grown eggs are the best, no matter what color, but trying to convince the masses is beyond me. My breed choices are a reflection of my laziness and social deficits.

I had a harder time successfully hatching guinea eggs last year. This year I find them easier to see/read and I have more eggs so I don't spend as much time with them...and I find they're doing better this year.

Still not as good as a broody...but I'm ok with that. Maybe you're worrying when you don't need to be. Of course I haven't done ducks. It's a killer waiting that long for them though...just like guinea eggs.

I have the same gamut of egg colors as you.

 

[Wickedchicken6]

In New Zealand our production breed is the Brown Shaver and they lay brown eggs. That's all you can buy at the shops. I have a few white egg layers and I love those white eggs! There is still the misconception here that brown eggs are better for you!

@JaeG It's funny, when I do see brown eggs in grocery stores here, because they're clearly being marketed towards the health conscious folks. The prices are usually quite high. White eggs are cheap and plentiful. All the misconceptions about color crack me up. People have some crazy questions and theories about the blue and green eggs especially.

I'm nearing the end of my hatch over here. Of course the last few eggs are giving me drama. One of the Ancona X eggs has a pip in a less than ideal place and through a vein. Fingers crossed. Uggghhhh.

This brings me back to the subject of experimenting. These Ancona X eggs were freebies, mostly because they were a few days older than what the breeder would normally sell. Plus they were also the product of an experimental pairing. I like to throw in older eggs on occasion and I've had plenty of success AND drama.

@Wickedchicken6 Got any old egg experience? I have a feeling you've tried some things. Lol. Longest period from collection to incubation? I'm over here with my trying to keep my hands out of my own incubator. Sheeesh.

That's exactly like the brown eggs here as well. They are marketed as being a "healthier" choice.

 

[lastco]

I'm 100% worrying too much!! Bahahaha! The longer incubation has deterred me as well. Btw, those OEGBs are precious!

All these unlikely (or maybe not so unlikely!) survival stories are enlightening. I don't know a lot of poultry people in real life, so this method of sharing information is wonderful. How many people might double or triple check an egg that should be dead according to the standard "rules" of incubation after seeing a thread like this?

 

[Bluechick2u]

That's exactly like the brown eggs here as well. They are marketed as being a "healthier" choice.

I have actually had repeat egg customers suddenly freak out when they learned that the eggs have been fertilized all along, they said "I don't want to crack one open and find a partly developed one..." I finally got through to them that there's no visible difference, just don't incubate them, but they definitely had preconceived notions about eggs that I am sure came from advertisements

 

[Wickedchicken6]

@JaeG It's funny, when I do see brown eggs in grocery stores here, because they're clearly being marketed towards the health conscious folks. The prices are usually quite high. White eggs are cheap and plentiful. All the misconceptions about color crack me up. People have some crazy questions and theories about the blue and green eggs especially.

I'm nearing the end of my hatch over here. Of course the last few eggs are giving me drama. One of the Ancona X eggs has a pip in a less than ideal place and through a vein. Fingers crossed. Uggghhhh.

This brings me back to the subject of experimenting. These Ancona X eggs were freebies, mostly because they were a few days older than what the breeder would normally sell. Plus they were also the product of an experimental pairing. I like to throw in older eggs on occasion and I've had plenty of success AND drama.

@Wickedchicken6 Got any old egg experience? I have a feeling you've tried some things. Lol. Longest period from collection to incubation? I'm over here with my trying to keep my hands out of my own incubator. Sheeesh.

How did you know???
I've got old egg, no turning eggs and more cold egg experience!
Most of it is buried within other threads on here...lol.

In 2015, I started with old eggs. REALLY old eggs. I've been modest in saying they were 3+ weeks...but it just occurred to me last night that I could figure out the dates with the digital tags of the pictures. So I did.

Blue June 15th: Our grand MIL's funeral. We picked our chickens up after the funeral.
Red June 28th: Our chickens were predated one day short of two weeks
Pink August 19th: The first pic of those three chicks hatched from the old eggs was taken August 20...so August 19 for hatching.
July29: The eggs hatched would've been set approx. July 29.
That would mean the hatched eggs were at least 4 weeks old.
(Why didn't I figure this out sooner?)

In the two weeks we had the chickens, I left all the eggs hoping they'd start setting...lol. Those eggs laid there, untouched. They didn't get handled or turned until I put them in the incubator.

I didn't start building my incubator until the 3 week point...lol. There were a couple pails of eggs so I stuffed the incubator full. Then as soon as it was apparent eggs weren't developing, I refilled those empty spots. The eggs were silkie cross, OEGB and a brown egg layer so the shells were easier for a newbie to see into.

This was my first try/experience with hatching. I didn't have any calibrated thermometers or hygrometers. Basically, I was winging it to the best of my abilities.
I think luck MUST have been on my side.

The two white chicks (two Silkie crosses) and the gray chick on the right side are the chicks I resurrected.

We were left with two hens; an EE and an OEGB and three roosters that were moved to a secure enclosure. Once they started laying again I also incubated their eggs. Those are the other chicks in the pic above.

I still have all three, all are conformationally correct and haven't had any health related issues to date.

Babygirl is one of my smallest hens. She takes no guff and is a top row hen...lol.
She's a total sweetheart and one of my favorites. (Pic taken tonight)

The gray chick turned into the gray hen who lays an aqua colored egg.

The white feathered leg chick turned out to be the white Silkied Rooster above.

 

[Wickedchicken6]

yep, i definitely prefer fresh eggs, but i had room and wasn't going to use those eggs otherwise so didn't have anything to lose. But i agree, you never know what you'll get really.

I'm 100% worrying too much!! Bahahaha! The longer incubation has deterred me as well. Btw, those OEGBs are precious!

All these unlikely (or maybe not so unlikely!) survival stories are enlightening. I don't know a lot of poultry people in real life, so this method of sharing information is wonderful. How many people might double or triple check an egg that should be dead according to the standard "rules" of incubation after seeing a thread like this?

I'm the opposite of VWduckchick. I like setting old eggs. It's how I started. I feel comfortable doing it. The same with staggered hatching. It's how I started out. I don't mind being in the last three days (lockdown) and opening the incubator to turn eggs. Or...sometimes I don't turn them at all...

My idea and hope of setting old eggs and not being so careful is that over time, if I continually set old eggs and I select the best chickens from the embryos/chicks that survive...eventually the eggs produced by these chickens should hatch at an above average rate with above average chickens that excel above the norm...much like wild animals do. Selection of the fittest...same thing.

So a lot of last summer/fall eggs were set as old eggs. So far I've found the embryos live or die. The ones that make it are fine. I've been setting older guinea eggs this year. I've got some that must be a month or more that I plan on setting soon.

I decided to push the envelope and I stopped turning eggs. The eggs got turned only when I candled. I still got a surprising amount of chicks. (I think that's why I keep forgetting to turn the 60 hour eggs)

The post below best shows some of the chicks I've hatched not turning.

[URL="https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/im-building-an-incubator-please-dont-bother-asking-permission-to-laugh-at-me.1124301/page-86#post-17588129"]I'm Building an Incubator - please don't bother asking permission to laugh at me[/URL]

I've also had two other cold egg experiences. The first was a broody on the wrong nest leaving her own eggs cold for approximately 11 hours. The eggs were probably just over the week old.

I also forgot my incubator off and open on tax day for about 10 hours. Everything was fine.

But the 4 week old eggs that hatched (three eggs) and the 60 hour embryos have been the most extreme for me.