Newnanchic, I'm sorry on the losses. It's been a hard hatch for us too! New2chooks, we started with 24 eggs bought/shipped, the effects of the trip noted in post one, we put in 20 to hatch but were not "too hopeful" on the 10 that were egg coated with yolk in the first carton and quite frankly with broken eggs in the second carton in there although they were free of yolk (not soaked like the first coat), this hatch has been an act of faith and hope and many prayers. So we have marked box one and two on the eggs and from what I can see in the cabinet incubator, none of the egg soaked ones made it through although they were wiped off. I'm wondering now if I should have added the egg soaked ones at all because there is a real smell in that incubator and wonder if any fumes came off them that were bad for the other eggs.
If any of you wipe off eggs those that got Yolked in transit, please describe how you wipe them off and with what.....These had been wet so long that they were crusty and I suspect that even though I gently wiped, that the bloom was gone or that the yolk had sealed the breathing space even when I wiped. I was happy to get these eggs and don't regret buying them. They just hit a rough spot on the road!
I'm grateful to the Lord for the little 4 chickens that have hatched the little lav orpingtons and hope we will get more chicks over this humpty dumpty hatch time as we continue to look at the world's longest hatch! And again, I'm grateful for the blessings of these four little ones and to the original shipper who sent me an additional 16 eggs for the price of shipping as this will give us a second chance.
So we now have Humpty and Dumpty and Jack and Jill but of course only Jack is a boy!
Thanks for all the support and I'm continuing the hatch forward as long as it takes! Please continue to be with us as we are now in day 24!
