How well did your first ever hatch turn out?

[FarmerVal]

I'm about to set some eggs for the first time ever and I'm a little nervous. Curious to know how your first hatch went

 

[FireTigeris]

I set half shipped half my own eggs I had a 72% hatch.

 

[Illia]

My very first ever hatch was a complete failure

It was with a Little Giant, it was with my own hen's eggs, and. . . I got 3 fertile, none hatched. From that point on, that bator never gave me any chicks, so I chucked it.

But on the brighter side, my first shipped eggs I got after that was a 100% hatch rate.

 

[awesomefowl]

Out of 9 shipped eggs only 2 hatched and both died.

 

[FarmerVal]

These will be shipped eggs too. I ordered 6 Blue Orpingtons (which I hear can be tricky...?) and 12 Buff Orpingtons. Hoping to to buy a couple Ameraucana's too.

 

[wsdareme]

It was a disaster. I got 7 great, fertile BCM eggs from a local breeder, and I couldn't have asked for more from my Brinsea Mini Advanced. But when the chicks started to hatch and were knocking the other eggs around, I tried to "shake" the incubator to keep them off the other eggs and ended up spilling a bunch of water from the reservoir. The humidity must have skyrocketed, and I ended up losing 4 of the 7 to excessive humidity. Let me tell you, I learned my lesson. My second hatch was great. I did start taking the chicks out after the first two hatched because the humidity was high enough they weren't drying off, but all 7 survived and thrived. I'm on my third hatch, this time my own eggs. I hope I've learned enough from the last two times to have a successful hatch this time.

 

[barrelmom]

I just finished my first hatch. I used eggs shipped from Michigan to Texas. I set 11 eggs and 7 hatched into healthy chicks. Two of the duds died well before lockdown - like days 5 & 10. One pipped through a vein and died at hatch and the other one???.

 

[FarmerVal]

Quote:
Oh no! Glad the second went better. Hope your third is even better than the last! I'm sure I'll make some mistakes this time, but I'm hoping for at least a few viable eggs. If all goes as planned I'll be setting 24 eggs...

 

[FarmerVal]

Quote:
My eggs should be coming from Florida and Georgia (I am in TN) so it's not a long haul for them. I wouldn't be disappointed at all with that hatch rate!

 

[Illia]

My first shipped eggs came from Michigan in early freezing February all the way over to Washington state, and they were fine.

It often all is about packing, and the other part is about what the weather is like. There were no major storms during the time my eggs got shipped to me, but it was indeed very cold out in MI.