I found this great Omaha Steak box in the shed I forgot I had.
I have eggs in an incubator now...one of those cheap jobs from Tractor Supply for about 40 bucks. It is holding the temp just fine, and I hand turn three times a day right on schedule. All the eggs are from my flock and this is my first hatch in an incubator. Last year, and this year I've had 5 broody hens hatch all very successfully.
So I gathered eggs from everyone for this first batch. I can figure out which are the Seabright eggs because they are much smaller, but didn't think I had any D'Uccle eggs until yesterday when I caught my D'Uccle hen laying and knew for sure the egg was hers. She lays much rounder eggs than the other chickens...OE. I want to raise for chicks the Seabrights and the D'Uccles and have the OE for a few replacement chicks, and for eggs.
I put 26 eggs in the bator but then about a week later the 2 Seabrights gave me five eggs and I couldn't resist adding them to the bator. So now I have a staggered hatch. I planned on putting them under some hen that went broody, but so far that isn't happening. It seems to me that it would simplify things greatly to have an incubator for the first 18 days and a hatching incubator for lockdown. And I have the steak box. I'd make the lockdown box out of that.
Then...as long as I kept careful track of how long eggs have been in hatching box, I could transfer them on day 18 into the lockdown box. And I'm thinking that soon we are to have days over 90 degrees and it won't be too hard to take my small space heater and add ten degrees to my bathroom temp to make the transfer. Or...do it in my big shed where when the sun shines on it, it already gets most of the way to 100 degrees in there.
I'm thinking that I could have staggered hatches with as few as one egg. Put it in the hatching box for 18 days then transfer it to the lockdown box. Even if I did the hatching one egg at a time I'd only have to open the lockdown box every two days as the chick can live in there for 24 hours plus anyway. But if the lockdown box was opened in an area that has the right temperature and humidity then it should not matter if it is opened anyway.
There has to be obvious problems with this...does anyone have an opinion?
I have eggs in an incubator now...one of those cheap jobs from Tractor Supply for about 40 bucks. It is holding the temp just fine, and I hand turn three times a day right on schedule. All the eggs are from my flock and this is my first hatch in an incubator. Last year, and this year I've had 5 broody hens hatch all very successfully.
So I gathered eggs from everyone for this first batch. I can figure out which are the Seabright eggs because they are much smaller, but didn't think I had any D'Uccle eggs until yesterday when I caught my D'Uccle hen laying and knew for sure the egg was hers. She lays much rounder eggs than the other chickens...OE. I want to raise for chicks the Seabrights and the D'Uccles and have the OE for a few replacement chicks, and for eggs.
I put 26 eggs in the bator but then about a week later the 2 Seabrights gave me five eggs and I couldn't resist adding them to the bator. So now I have a staggered hatch. I planned on putting them under some hen that went broody, but so far that isn't happening. It seems to me that it would simplify things greatly to have an incubator for the first 18 days and a hatching incubator for lockdown. And I have the steak box. I'd make the lockdown box out of that.
Then...as long as I kept careful track of how long eggs have been in hatching box, I could transfer them on day 18 into the lockdown box. And I'm thinking that soon we are to have days over 90 degrees and it won't be too hard to take my small space heater and add ten degrees to my bathroom temp to make the transfer. Or...do it in my big shed where when the sun shines on it, it already gets most of the way to 100 degrees in there.
I'm thinking that I could have staggered hatches with as few as one egg. Put it in the hatching box for 18 days then transfer it to the lockdown box. Even if I did the hatching one egg at a time I'd only have to open the lockdown box every two days as the chick can live in there for 24 hours plus anyway. But if the lockdown box was opened in an area that has the right temperature and humidity then it should not matter if it is opened anyway.
There has to be obvious problems with this...does anyone have an opinion?
