Hatching pullet eggs

[Trish1974]

How do you know when a pullet's eggs are mature enough to incubate? I have an 8 1/2 old bantam Araucana pullet that began laying late February (at 6 months of age). Her eggs were a consistent size of 1.31 oz. The past 2 weeks her eggs have been consistent at 1.34 oz. I'm getting ready to set a batch of eggs Wednesday; should I throw in a few bantam eggs or give her more time to mature?

 

[casportpony]

Do they look like normal sized eggs? If so, I think they will be fine. Personally, I avoid setting them if they are those small pullet eggs.

 

[Trish1974]

Do they look like normal sized eggs? If so, I think they will be fine. Personally, I avoid setting them if they are those small pullet eggs.

Well, it's hard to tell because she is my first and only bantam. I really don't have anything to compare it to.

 

[casportpony]

Well, it's hard to tell because she is my first and only bantam. I really don't have anything to compare it to.

Let me go weigh one of my banty eggs.

 

[casportpony]

I think that if they have been a consistent size for two weeks it's probably okay to set them.

I think @Pyxis knows a lot about setting pullet eggs.

Oh, and I just weighed an egg from a hen I have that is about the size of a Cochin banty and it was 40 grams (1.4 ounces)

 

[smoothmule]

How did the hatching go?

 

[Trish1974]

How did the hatching go?

Thank you for asking. I ended up not setting any of the bantam's eggs. Around that time I got an email from Nancy Utterback asking if I wanted the rest of her LF Araucanas, as she was cutting back and going to just keep bantams from now on. So I ended up hatching from her mature birds this past summer.