Hatching Peafowl - Totally new to this

[BirdsBeesTrees]

From what I understood the high mortality rate was expected so I am prepared for that. But I would like to try it. The eggs seems to be a lot cheaper than buying adult birds unless I'm just not looking in the right places.

I can understand that, I've spent a lot of money for eggs. I bought 7 orders of eggs and got 3 Peachicks to hatch, mostly because the post office scrambled the eggs in transit.
The eggs I got from my same state all hatched.

 

[Midnightman14]

From what I understood the high mortality rate was expected so I am prepared for that. But I would like to try it. The eggs seems to be a lot cheaper than buying adult birds unless I'm just not looking in the right places.

If you're trying to go the cheap route peafowl are definitely not for you. Starting from eggs is a money pit and most of the time you end up spending more on eggs than if you just bought juveniles. This is especially true if you have no experience with hatching and raising peafowl.

 

[Smashlee83]

If you're trying to go the cheap route peafowl are definitely not for you. Starting from eggs is a money pit and most of the time you end up spending more on eggs than if you just bought juveniles. This is especially true if you have no experience with hatching and raising peafowl.

Do you think this is due to how the eggs are shipped? Or is there something else that complicates it?

 

[KsKingBee]

I'd really like to attempt incubating peafowl. We are completely new to peafowl. Our thought is to create a hoop coop to house them separately from our chickens. I always hear how fragile they can be. Any tips, advice?

It is your money and your time, if it makes you happy to try hatching peafowl set your expectations low and go for it. The education you get from the experience is worth more than what you will spend.

 

[KsKingBee]

Do you think this is due to how the eggs are shipped? Or is there something else that complicates it?

When they say that peafowl eggs are fragile they mean that during shipping they become internally detached easily making the embryo unable to develop. Even eggs that are not shipped are not easy to hatch for different reasons, many of which have already been addressed here in this thread starting with the health of the birds all the way to the incubator settings and turning ratios.

 

[Midnightman14]

Do you think this is due to how the eggs are shipped? Or is there something else that complicates it?

It's partially shipping and partially fertility. Fertility in peafowl is much more unpredictable than it is in other types of poultry. You can have a world class breeder male and if the hens don't like him you'll end up with a bunch of duds. Even when they do like him you're very lucky if your fertility hits 75% before shipping. Shipping is hard on eggs because of the structure of the egg. Each egg has small threadlike structures called sclerae. The sclerae are like scaffolding and keep the yolk centered in the egg. Shipping often causes these sclerae to break which means the egg will not hatch. Chickens and other poultry have been domesticate longer so the sclerae in their eggs are much tougher. Peafowl are still fairly wild so their eggs are much more fragile. The same goes for the chicks.

 

[Smashlee83]

It's partially shipping and partially fertility. Fertility in peafowl is much more unpredictable than it is in other types of poultry. You can have a world class breeder male and if the hens don't like him you'll end up with a bunch of duds. Even when they do like him you're very lucky if your fertility hits 75% before shipping. Shipping is hard on eggs because of the structure of the egg. Each egg has small threadlike structures called sclerae. The sclerae are like scaffolding and keep the yolk centered in the egg. Shipping often causes these sclerae to break which means the egg will not hatch. Chickens and other poultry have been domesticate longer so the sclerae in their eggs are much tougher. Peafowl are still fairly wild so their eggs are much more fragile. The same goes for the chicks.

I really appreciate your detailed response

 

[achiapponi]

What do you all think about putting 2 baby chickens in with 1 peachick until the rest hatch? The baby chickens have not been outside yet and have only been in a brooder. They will be a month old in 4 days when the peachick hatches. I would wait to put them together until the peachick is at least 2 days old. Or is there still a big threat of disease?

 

[KsKingBee]

I wouldn't be concerned with the disease but the four-week-old chickens will run all over the peachick.

 

[achiapponi]

I wouldn't be concerned with the disease but the four-week-old chickens will run all over the peachick.

Ok thank you @KsKingBee! Do you think its better to have the chick alone until the other 4 peachicks are born a week later?