ChristinLewin
Chirping
- Jun 25, 2020
- 220
- 305
- 80
Quick recap:
Bought eggs on eBay end of May, 3 different sellers
1. Out of 13 Wyandotte eggs, 3 hatched and all are doing well. Most didn’t make it past day 7 or weren’t fertile, but we did have one make it to lockdown, pipped and then just stopped and died. We cracked the egg and it was a totally perfect RLB Wyandotte, yolk absorbed, just dead.
2. Out of 10 Blue Barnevelder eggs, 7 hatched, two died, 5 are alive and well BUT I didn’t get the Blue Barnie, just splash and silver Barnie
3. Out of 12 Barnyard Mix, 5 hatched, 3 had severe deformities (like half the brain exposed) and had to be culled and 2 are doing well. I’m pretty sure This seller has a bad inbreeding problem so obviously I won’t buy from her again.
to be noted: the Barnyard Mix came from Michigan and were lost in the postal system for almost a week so I wasn’t surprised at the low hatch rate. The other 2 dozen I received 2 day shipping from Florida and Louisiana (I’m in Maryland). All eggs settled for 24 hours at room temp before incubation. Humidity was 40-50% and then upped to 65% for hatch.
Fast forward a month. Determined to hatch a Blue Barnevelder and after reading about Dry Hatching, I ordered another batch of eggs, this time a huge selection of rare breeds, 3 Deathlayer, 2 Pavlovskaya, 3 Ayam Cemani, 4 Brabanter, 3 Araucana, 3 Isbar, 4 Silver Barnevelder And 3 Blue Barnevelder For a total of 25 eggs (not cheap, as you can imagine with the rare breeds) Shipped from Florida arrived July 3rd and started dry hatch July 4, even went as far as to cut tiny egg holders to start them standing up and secure their air cells better. The first 7 days, I did not rotate them or open the incubator and my humidity was around 25-30% for first 18 days. After reading a ton here on BYC about shipped eggs and how to repair the shifty air cells with shipped eggs, I was confident that I would have a better hatch rate this time. It was Far WORSE!!
i candled at Day 7,14,18 and little by little they started dying off. I expected that somewhat because they are shipped eggs but I was heartbroken when the last of the Blue Barnevelder quit around day 12
Around Day 10, I realized that the eggs weren’t turning automatically for some reason so I would turn them by pushing the rotate button on the incubator, but I’m sure it wasn’t hourly or even close to hourly.
Out of 25 fertile shipped eggs, only ONE hatched and that was only with assistance!!!
At lockdown I candled and had hope for 2 Silver Barnevelder, 1 Ayam Cemani, 1 Brabanter, and the 3 “control group” eggs I had added at the beginning from my own hens and roosters just as a test. I had 5 originally but 2 were infertile so only 3 went to Lockdown. All together, 30 eggs were started July 4th and yesterday we finished the hatch with 4 total chicks, 3 from the control group, and one Silver Barnevelder. Yup. One chick from the 25 that shipped to me. I call them my “hundred dollar chicken” now
Of course I’m upset with the whole failed hatch and because I’m a sucker for punishment, I ordered half a dozen Blue Barnevelder, 9 RLB Wyandotte, and 9 Isbar (new seller but across the country so I don’t have high hopes).
I am giving shipped eggs one more chance and would love any tips or tricks to get a better batch this time!!
2 of the packages are at the post office now(Isbar and Wyandotte) and the other package will be there tomorrow(Barnevelder) I will start incubation Wednesday after the Tuesday eggs have a day to rest.
That’s a lot of backstory but I wanted to add as much detail as possible to try and help hatch shipped eggs with better than 1/25
Help!!!
Bought eggs on eBay end of May, 3 different sellers
1. Out of 13 Wyandotte eggs, 3 hatched and all are doing well. Most didn’t make it past day 7 or weren’t fertile, but we did have one make it to lockdown, pipped and then just stopped and died. We cracked the egg and it was a totally perfect RLB Wyandotte, yolk absorbed, just dead.
2. Out of 10 Blue Barnevelder eggs, 7 hatched, two died, 5 are alive and well BUT I didn’t get the Blue Barnie, just splash and silver Barnie
3. Out of 12 Barnyard Mix, 5 hatched, 3 had severe deformities (like half the brain exposed) and had to be culled and 2 are doing well. I’m pretty sure This seller has a bad inbreeding problem so obviously I won’t buy from her again.
to be noted: the Barnyard Mix came from Michigan and were lost in the postal system for almost a week so I wasn’t surprised at the low hatch rate. The other 2 dozen I received 2 day shipping from Florida and Louisiana (I’m in Maryland). All eggs settled for 24 hours at room temp before incubation. Humidity was 40-50% and then upped to 65% for hatch.
Fast forward a month. Determined to hatch a Blue Barnevelder and after reading about Dry Hatching, I ordered another batch of eggs, this time a huge selection of rare breeds, 3 Deathlayer, 2 Pavlovskaya, 3 Ayam Cemani, 4 Brabanter, 3 Araucana, 3 Isbar, 4 Silver Barnevelder And 3 Blue Barnevelder For a total of 25 eggs (not cheap, as you can imagine with the rare breeds) Shipped from Florida arrived July 3rd and started dry hatch July 4, even went as far as to cut tiny egg holders to start them standing up and secure their air cells better. The first 7 days, I did not rotate them or open the incubator and my humidity was around 25-30% for first 18 days. After reading a ton here on BYC about shipped eggs and how to repair the shifty air cells with shipped eggs, I was confident that I would have a better hatch rate this time. It was Far WORSE!!
i candled at Day 7,14,18 and little by little they started dying off. I expected that somewhat because they are shipped eggs but I was heartbroken when the last of the Blue Barnevelder quit around day 12
Around Day 10, I realized that the eggs weren’t turning automatically for some reason so I would turn them by pushing the rotate button on the incubator, but I’m sure it wasn’t hourly or even close to hourly.
Out of 25 fertile shipped eggs, only ONE hatched and that was only with assistance!!!
At lockdown I candled and had hope for 2 Silver Barnevelder, 1 Ayam Cemani, 1 Brabanter, and the 3 “control group” eggs I had added at the beginning from my own hens and roosters just as a test. I had 5 originally but 2 were infertile so only 3 went to Lockdown. All together, 30 eggs were started July 4th and yesterday we finished the hatch with 4 total chicks, 3 from the control group, and one Silver Barnevelder. Yup. One chick from the 25 that shipped to me. I call them my “hundred dollar chicken” now
Of course I’m upset with the whole failed hatch and because I’m a sucker for punishment, I ordered half a dozen Blue Barnevelder, 9 RLB Wyandotte, and 9 Isbar (new seller but across the country so I don’t have high hopes).
I am giving shipped eggs one more chance and would love any tips or tricks to get a better batch this time!!
2 of the packages are at the post office now(Isbar and Wyandotte) and the other package will be there tomorrow(Barnevelder) I will start incubation Wednesday after the Tuesday eggs have a day to rest.
That’s a lot of backstory but I wanted to add as much detail as possible to try and help hatch shipped eggs with better than 1/25
Help!!!
