High Altitude Heritage Turkey Hatch-A-Long

[Coops Dad]

I hope you get at least a few poults out of all this. I've had turkeys for a couple of years and think they've got more personality and are more social than our chickens. They're almost doglike in their desire to be near people. I have eleven turkeys right now, including one Broad Breasted White that loves to be scratched on her back and under her wings; she makes a lot of noises when I'm doing it, and my wife says I'm bothering her, but she doesn't try to get away and follows me and tries to get in front of me so I'll keep scratching her.

It's going to be a sad day when it's time for processing.

 

[samanthaoverton]

Just read all your posts. I'm all caught up. This is my first time incubating turkeys too..I'm not getting hopeful. I live in the mountains of TN. Obviously not at your elevation. This was a good read.. I wish you luck.

 

[Hayduke27]

I hope you get at least a few poults out of all this. I've had turkeys for a couple of years and think they've got more personality and are more social than our chickens. They're almost doglike in their desire to be near people. I have eleven turkeys right now, including one Broad Breasted White that loves to be scratched on her back and under her wings; she makes a lot of noises when I'm doing it, and my wife says I'm bothering her, but she doesn't try to get away and follows me and tries to get in front of me so I'll keep scratching her.

It's going to be a sad day when it's time for processing.

Yeah, my Tom seeks me out every chance he gets, and is always gobbling at me and looking at me from the run, begging to be let out so he can come and hang out with me. Usually that consists of him displaying and walking circles around me for as long as he is out, ha!

 

[Hayduke27]

Just read all your posts. I'm all caught up. This is my first time incubating turkeys too..I'm not getting hopeful. I live in the mountains of TN. Obviously not at your elevation. This was a good read.. I wish you luck.

Thanks for reading! I figured that with all this time and effort, at least if I make a record of it here maybe somebody can learn something from my mess! Plus I like when I fond out that others are out there trying to do the same thing!

 

[Coops Dad]

Yeah, my Tom seeks me out every chance he gets, and is always gobbling at me and looking at me from the run, begging to be let out so he can come and hang out with me. Usually that consists of him displaying and walking circles around me for as long as he is out, ha!

I just came back in from giving them a snack. We ended up with a large tray of leftover sub sandwiches, a veggie tray and fruit tray that were all left out overnight from an easter gathering. These birds are going to be fat fat fat!

Like Chief Brody said in the excellent documentary Jaws, "We're gonna need a bigger freezer!"

 

[Hayduke27]

@Coops Dad I love Jaws! I always say it's got to be one of the best fishing movies ever made.

 

[Hayduke27]

Today is day 14 for the lone survivor of the first batch of eggs, and it's day 7 for the second batch. I just weighed and candled everybody. Here's what I'm seeing this go-round:

The OG egg is now completely dark except for the air pocket, so obviously developing. It was very under-weight already, and at this point it has not lost any more, perhaps gained a gram. This little egg had a traumatic start, but it seems to be hanging in there. I don't know what to think of it.

As for the others, some are a little under-weight, some are a little over. I'd say they average out to being right about on track for the 14% weight loss by hatch day. The humidity has been between 65% and 70% for their whole incubation, which I know seems really high, but maybe that's the trick at this altitude. I read a very helpful article about high altitude hatches that said if you want similar hatching conditions as 40% humidity at sea level, a person at my altitude needs to keep the humidity at about 63%. That's what inspired me to change this hatch, along with the extreme weight loss on that first batch.

Also, I am seeing veins developing in some of the eggs! Some I wasn't so sure, but there are definitely 2 or 3 showing significant veining already, so that's just great! I am feeling a little optimism with this batch.

I'll be receiving my last batch of eggs today. The incubator is going to be very full, I'm going to have to keep a close eye on conditions in there. My chicken math seems to have caught up with my turkey eggs on this one.

 

[Hayduke27]

I think I did my math wrong last post. Anyway, today the OG egg went into lockdown (should have gone in last night but I was too tired). I have my styrofoam incubator set up and stabilized for the hatch out, if it should happen. It's mighty dark in that egg, it's full of something. We'll see if it shows any signs of life this weekend.

As for the second batch, they are now on day 17. I candled them while I was moving the OG egg. There is only 1 showing much promise. These eggs came from a different farm and were muddy. I didn't wipe the mud off, and not sure if that had any effect. One egg has veining, several others have ambiguous dark spots. Of 7 of them, I pulled one out as it was still very clear and obviously not developing. I'll let the others go a little longer before I start pulling them out.

Of the newest batch of 12, it's only day 4 so I didn't even bother looking yet. They are from the same farm as the original bunch. We'll see what happens... It's been quite the adventure so far.

 

[Hayduke27]

So the egg on lockdown has not been as locked down as I hoped. I had forgotten how difficult it is to stabilize my old styrofoam incubator. I had everything from full heat but only able to get it up to 94*, then I partially covered one of the vents and overnight it went up to 116* with 99% humidity. Luckily the egg was not in there at this time. It spend another day or two in the original incubator because I could sense the troubles with the foam one.

Log story short, the styrofoam incubator is stabilized at 75%-80% humidity and 98*-99*. The egg has been in there since yesterday afternoon, and so lockdown is slightly late but official. I haven't heard any peeping or anything, but admittedly I have not been hanging out in that room much. Tomorrow evening is roughly hatch time if the egg is alive, so I'll be keeping a close eye on things.

Tonight or tomorrow I'm going to do a big round of candling for all the remaining eggs. I should be able to pull a few out of the second bunch if they are not developing, and it will be my first look at the final batch of 12 eggs. Today is actually only day 6 for them, as I put them in last Friday evening, so that's why I may delay the candling for another day.

Finally, I happened across straight run Bronze Breasted turkeys locally, and riding on my pessimism toward my hatching ability, I went ahead and got 6 of them. This way, even if my hatch totally fails, my tom will at least have turkey friends. My chicken math has spilled over to the dang turkeys...

 

[Hayduke27]

So far no action in the lockdown. No peeps, no wiggles. This evening is officially day 28. As this first batch of eggs had such a traumatic early incubation, I would honestly be surprised if this chick pulled through. But we shall see, it continued to develop until it was fully dark in the egg, and lockdown conditions are really stable right now. I still have a little hope I guess.

I candled all the eggs today. Of the second batch, of which there are 6 left and they are on day 15, one is alive and moving in there. The others are all looking like they maybe had a little development but aren't alive now. They were "maybe-ish" enough that I put them back in, and I'm going to wait a couple more days before I throw them away. Of the third batch of 12, 3 are definitely alive and veining. Another 4 are hard to tell but maybe and the 5 remaining are looking pretty clear. I'm going to give it about 3 more days, then candle again and pull some eggs out.

Speaking of this, I know that part of the reason to pull the non-developing eggs out is so they won't rupture and get rotten egg all over the inside of the incubator. However, I have, in the past, left eggs in for the full hatch period that didn't hatch and they never broke or caused problems. How frequent is rotten-egg-explosion in the incubator? How concerned should I be? I can imagine the nightmare of cleaning up that mess if it happened.