If you have tuned in to follow along with my science project of trying to hatch more females than males... here is my latest chapter... and it is a doozy.
I have been trying to organize my records, thoughts, 'data'.... and I will say right here that I could have done better.... but the results have been most interesting.
(My last comment above dated April 8 apparently was not finished and I have no idea what I was supposed to be saying. Sorry.)
I decided to use a combination of 'older eggs' (one of the last comments/ideas from above), refrigeration time and slightly cooler incubator temp. I did not keep record of how old the eggs were, but I would say 7 to 9 days-- because as a general rule, I do not incubate eggs 10+ days old. Eggs were refrigerated 4/3 until 4/6 and set on 4/7. Eggs were 6 olive egger (F1 OE hen × RIR roo-- both roughly a year old) and 8 green Easter Eggers (EE X EE-- roughly 6 -8 years old)
Candled on day 9 and again before placing into hatcher on day 19. 3 of 14 removed for not being viable in some way (infertile, quitter). 11 went into hatcher, 10 hatched. 4 OE and 6 EE.
Note: One would think I would have picked something more easily sexable than EEs to test, but I needed them.
I made a very long post asking for best guesses... lots of pictures.... trying to ascertain the sex of these chicks. At the beginning, it looked like I had mostly males.
Of the 4 OE, the cockerel made it easy for me with that red comb and general disposition soooooo early.... and based on RIR sexing, I was able to determine that the 3 others were females. OEs were done.
The EEs though.... my word. Over a period of weeks.... it was iffy. I spent more time staring at, watching behavior, stance and taking pictures of chicks than I have in my entire life. The last comment on the big EE sexing post... the gal said that all of the EEs looked FEMALE. I said 'okay'....entertained the thought for 5 minutes, but said 'nahhhh'... because 50/50 is normal.
Alas no. The chicks are circling in on 18 weeks. And it **would seem** (im still refusing to believe it even though there is no more crowing, dominant male behavior...) that i have 9 females and 1 male.
I am not getting super stoked about anything until I can repeat this with similar results.
Figured I should update the patient souls that find this entertaining.
I see lots of posts from people who start experiments, but not nearly as many telling what the results were.
) for kicks, so it will be awhile. At least I have it more or less documented. 
