Hatching Silkies, well.....Trying to hatch Silkies

[Silkie-Feet]

I've had a silkie cross sit on 16 eggs(average eggs)! my silkie is currently sitting on 11 bantam eggs

 

[renovationmom]

Quote:
Wow. I have not tried more then 9 bantam eggs with my silkies. Something to think about. Do you just consider what the hen can cover, egg size and nest box size when determining how many eggs to let them hatch?

 

[deeps]

are you supposed to let a hen only sit on so many eggs?

I've always just let them sit on how ever many they claimed then remove the blanks after candling around day 10...

 

[renovationmom]

Quote:
Thanks for your help. I have one silkie hen that is my smallest, I give her only 6 bantam eggs, but the rest of my hens I have given 9 bantam eggs to hatch, with good results. I have read where some of the silkie breeders have hens that sit on 15 eggs! I wasn't sure after reading this, if I was being over conservative when setting eggs for my hens. (If I could safely allow the girls to hatch more, I would not try to incubate, I am really getting discouraged with my results.

 

[renovationmom]

Just wanted to give an update, I boosted the humidity up to 70%-and hatched 18 out of 22 healthy baby chicks! Thank you everyone for your help.

 

[zebserema]

wowo good job

 

[MuskokaChick]

Yay! Congrats!

Day 13 here...down to 4 eggs from 8 *sigh*

 

[zebserema]

Quote:
your the one that droped an egg right oh well it happens im on day 17 through 8 i know its bad but my eggs are numberd 1 - 9 that being the day i started the incubation and my silkie is setting 6 eggs

 

[renovationmom]

Quote:
your the one that droped an egg right oh well it happens im on day 17 through 8 i know its bad but my eggs are numberd 1 - 9 that being the day i started the incubation and my silkie is setting 6 eggs

Thanks everyone, sorry your hatches not going well, I sure know how that is, I had two bad hatches in a row, adjusted everything you could think of, finally, found the humidity was not high enough. Sad to loose all those babies, and two months of them(not to mention the eggs I ordered off ebay-I do not want to even think about how much I lost there. My own fault though, I should have waited awhile before trying to hatch anything else but my own eggs. My first two hatches went so well, I did not think I would have trouble.

 

[MuskokaChick]

yeah I dropped an egg

left me with 4...but it seems 3 have filled the whole space of the egg (except air space) and one doesn't seem to be getting any bigger and no movement...leaving it in, but figure it's a goner...

Day 16 here now!