I thought we were a hatching failure...but.....

[seabreeze]

Having had some so-so successful hatches with our own eggs encouraged us to purchase eggs from others. These eggs were shipped and of course, our already so-so hatch rate of about 45-50% made us hopeful we'd be able to hatch out purchased eggs. Like throwing money out the window (for us anyway). Several batches of purchased eggs candled with nothing in them; several with developing embryos but stopped only a few days in and the rest upon opening (after failure to hatch), showed various stages of being *scrambled* but none were beyond embryo stage.

Figures, today, the eggs slated for hatching from our own flock of Marans are starting to pip. Only 8 in bator but 2 are pipping so will see what it brings total. Just wanted to share the perils of shipped eggs and at first I beat myself up for failure but don't feel quite as badly as I did given the state of the fertility and/or lack of development. Postal service is definitely a risk!

 

[gamebirdsonly]

Yes shipped eggs are a high risk. If your lucky to get 50% to hatch from shipped eggs on average on each batch your doing real good. I'm happy if I can get 1 to 2 eggs to hatch from every shipped batch of eggs.

 

[seabreeze]

Thanks Gamebird. Our 50%+ hatch rate is with our own eggs. So far, purchased eggs have averaged around 1-2 eggs per dozen, same as yours. I bought a dozen lovely dark Marans eggs off of Ebay and ONE hatched. Its name is.....

.....Ebay of course and its a roo! At least, if he's quality upon evaluation, I can use him!