Hatch-a-long, set March 1, hatch March 21/22

[HomesteadNowhere]

I love Brahmas!

They are interesting. Mine separate themselves and kind of do their own thing from the rest of the flock. They did pretty much from the start.
My only thing is they aren't really what I'm going for but if they continue to lay well they may become the layer side of the flock while I breed the meaty experiments lol. I'm hoping they go broody!
They are quite light. Not much to them. Hoping now separated they will get their fair share of feed, away from the apparently hog-chickens. And bred to a meaty NH or Bielefelder the offspring should be better than them.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

This is worse than lambing! The eggs only just went in lockdown and I'm already anxious for hatching! Heaven help me. When one starts hatching I'll be in here parked in front of the incubator like a kid waiting for the parents to get up on Christmas morning...

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

Got one little cheep-cheep! I thought I was hallucinating for a minute til it did peep again

 

[Owllea]

I think some of the eggs are moving a bit…I keep coming back and thinking “I didn’t leave you guys in that arrangement”. But not much else happening here. I must sleep so of course I’ll miss something! My humidity is not doing great, at about 55-60% right now so hope it stays high enough if anyone bloops out overnight.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

I have a little sauce sized Tupperware with cotton balls to up the humidity. Added a salsa jar of water. Still wasn't up alot. Added a cut off strip of rag to act as a wick. Now holding at 56%

I weighed all the eggs right before lockdown. Anything that was close to right on 12% weight loss I check marked on the egg. Anything more than 2 grams lower in weight (extra weight loss) I marked low on the egg. We'll see if there is a difference in their hatching.
I also took the dated eggs and put them all on one side. So we'll see if the more recent eggs vs unknown age fridge eggs hatch at different times.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

Got a tiny pip! I'm attempting to go to sleep.. attempting.. kind of..

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

I've got babies! One chick is out from the egg that was only just pipped and three are now pipped! All are the dated eggs.
The chick isn't fully dried yet. It looks yellow or buff.

 

[chickfused]

How we doing?!?

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

How we doing?!?

Had to go to the auction to sell hay. I'm excited to see how many there are when I get back. When I left there was 2 chicks that looked a shade of buff and at least 4 pipped eggs.
Of that one of the pipped eggs was on the fridge side, the rest were all the dated eggs.

Of the two chicks one was smaller and mayyybe spotted feathers on it's legs. The other (first to hatch) was much bigger. I'm suspecting that the FR (ranger) cross chicks will all/primarily be bigger hefty chicks.

 

[chickfused]

Waiting to see how it goes! Good luck at the auction and the incubator!