Incubating peafowl eggs thread

[AugeredIn]

I know Brad Legg has used cochins before. Around here it seems like game hens are the preferred surrogate mother. In your experience has fertility always been an issue during wet seasons?

One of the old hands around here taught me to leave all the hens for the season in a community pen with a couple of roos. Once they started sitting, he told me to pull the hens out of that community pen in the evening and set her in a private pen. She seems more likely to stay broody that way. Tried it with some silkies and it worked great. Going to try it with a bunch of game hens the first of the year. Chicks are already ordered but on hold due to AI scare. Hope it does not get worse and ruin everyones plans for next year.

 

[connerhills]

I have used game hens before but the were a little hard on the back of my hands when I moved eggs or candled them under the hen. I would set 5-6 hens the same time and then candle later, the bad I took out and consolidated the good ones under the another hens. Then reset them and anymore that were ready. I kept the hens setting for 2-3 clutches and let them hatch the last one. I have good luck with Sumatra's setting but some of them are pretty mean when you work them and I bleed real easy now. connerhills

 

[Peafowlssssssss]

This, of course, is the most common problem in peafowl hatching. I have been part of a group that has been playing with various incubating and hatching methods the last couple of years and sooner or later there will be some published results (not by me, I am small potatoes). This is the information that I can give you based upon last years information and this years information and may be contrary to anything I have written before:

1. The "real" peafowl hatch rates, even amongst the big boys is incredibly small when talking about the total number of eggs laid. I am talking ridiculously small. No one really like to admit this but it is true. I am not giving numbers but keep this in mind during your incubation and hatching efforts. LOTS of eggs never hatch.

2. I have, in the past, incubated eggs on the ends and laying down and did not notice a difference in numbers. This year we really focused on the difference and the eggs that were laid on their sides and hand rotated twice a day in the first 10 days (in addition to the normal turning in the GQF) FAR out hatched any other method.

3. It has always been my experience that if they are quiting just prior to lockdown they are usually to dry and there is no excess fluid under the membrane and they definitely appear dryer out in the eggtopsy (full credit to casportpony I believe for that term). Raise humidity 5-10% during incubation. This usually IS NOT the problem in my experience.

4. Our normal problem is that the eggtopsy reveals that there is still lots of free fluid under the membrane and there was to much humidity during incubation.

5. We used to adjust temperature to control problems and it seemed to work. Since we have really been keeping track of what we do, I no longer believe this to be true. I think 99.5 - 100 degrees is the best place to be.

6. We monitor oxygen/CO2 and with one side vent open in the GQF, it can get borderline low with higher humidity. We open both vents.

7. Our best hatches this year were at a temperature of 99.5 humidity at 35-40% five days a week and 50-60% during two days of lockdown. I know the lockdown number is low but thats all we can effectively get.

8. Other folks that are testing the use of Game hens either for 10 days, 25 days or the full incubation period out hatched the users of incubators.

9. I have tried both last year and this year to monitor egg weight to try and correlate to hatching success and humidity. If I am honest, it has been an utter failure both years. Don't know if I am not weighing a large enough sample or what the deal is but I can't tell anything from it or at least it is not consistent.

Lastly, I think the biggest truth is that none of us really know what we are doing given the hatch rates. You should look at your results, do eggtopsies, and make adjustments accordingly. Keep really good records and share what you find.

We will be using Game hens next year for at least half of our incubation efforts. I am convinced.

Thank you for the great post, brought many ideas to me.

I'm thinking about point number 3 in your post, i'm thinking of moving the eggs on day 23 to the hatcher(which is a real incubator that have auto turner), and keep the auto turner working and the humidity same as for the first 23 days, and then i will turn off the auto turner at day 25 and raise the humidity. Will this help preventing the chicks from getting dry? My room temp is 75, so i'm thinking maybe these few seconds while moving the eggs from the first incubator to the second one making the chicks get dry.

Also, i will open all the vents for the next hatch, even if the humidity only stayed around 65%.

I already have a dead chick from this hatch, which died before making the internal pip, i will open the egg and see how he looks.

Thanks again.


ETA: i opened the egg and the chick was trying to pip on the wrong end.

 

[RubyNala97]

My question is, on what day can you start to see veining, when candling? Also, if you have males & females in the same enclosure can you still have infertile eggs?

 

[Peafowlssssssss]

My question is, on what day can you start to see veining, when candling? Also, if you have males & females in the same enclosure can you still have infertile eggs?

I candle my eggs on day 7, but some eggs need to be candled again after day 10 because they are so dark.

And yes, you can still get infertile eggs.

 

[casportpony]

These pictures are for ducks, but you might find them useful:




-Kathy

 

[RubyNala97]

Thank you! 3 eggs are fairly light but 3 are very dark & speckled. It's only day 3, so I won't get worried yet that I'm not seeing any veining. That picture is very helpful!!

 

[AugeredIn]

Thank you for the great post, brought many ideas to me.

I'm thinking about point number 3 in your post, i'm thinking of moving the eggs on day 23 to the hatcher(which is a real incubator that have auto turner), and keep the auto turner working and the humidity same as for the first 23 days, and then i will turn off the auto turner at day 25 and raise the humidity. Will this help preventing the chicks from getting dry? My room temp is 75, so i'm thinking maybe these few seconds while moving the eggs from the first incubator to the second one making the chicks get dry.

Also, i will open all the vents for the next hatch, even if the humidity only stayed around 65%.

I already have a dead chick from this hatch, which died before making the internal pip, i will open the egg and see how he looks.

Thanks again.


ETA: i opened the egg and the chick was trying to pip on the wrong end.

I don't think moving the eggs makes any difference at all. My incubator is open at least 5 minutes twice a day and I still get good hatches. One thing I did not mention is that I have been locking down the eggs a day early. That seems to help. Maybe it gives them more time to position. I am also having them hatch early this year again.

 

[frenchblackcopper]

AugeredIN,,,I have always wondered the true results of the so called "big boys" In some breeding pens this year such as my Opals the hatchrate is again over 75% but on others to my suprise,such as my BSSP pen which was always a great hatchrate pen, has fallen on their faces this year in the neighborhhood of 35%. I would say from candling eggs the fertility rate in some of the pens is over 90% but in direct contrast in other pens such as my Peach I don't get but maybe 3 eggs a week. My Midnight b/s pen has a young two year old male breeding the 4 hens this year and egg output is very low. Part of this in both pens I contribute to new young males without full trains. The Peach pied male is 3 years old but this is the first time he has his own group of hens alone with him. Last year he and several other young males and young hens was in a group pen.

The weather here stinks,,rains everyday and has been heavy rain and it's been doing this for 2 weeks in a row now. It's difficult to collect clean eggs nightly because of the wet dirt in the pen floors. And the rains we have been getting are downpours totalling several inches not a quick shower and the sun then comes out. My humidaire incubator has 2 mercury thermometers but I also have 2 digital ones with probes inside. One probe on the top and the other on the second shelf of the 3 shelfs total. They each read between 100.8-101.4 but the mercury thermometers says these temps are right at 100 degrees inside. The temp is controlled by a wafer type thermostat,old but reliable. My incubator is outside in the garage and with all the humidity and rain we have been getting here most of the time the humidity inside the bator according to both the electric probes is over 60% and sometimes as high as 75%. Only once this season have I added water to the tray to increase this rate from 35%.. I too roll eggs twice a day and so far this year not one crooked toed peachick. (Now I hexed myself) Most all my eggs are pipped by the 25th day and out by day 27,,I've had a few that were alive in the egg but never pipped by day 26 and never pipped at all or subsequently hatched.

I fill the incubator each Sunday nite and keep written records of the weather for that weeks collected eggs. Lots of rain and cooler weather early on hurt hatchrates badly. Very low egg counts up until this week had me scratching my head as compared to the same weeks last year where I would get 80 eggs plus per week,and this year in the mid 30 number range.My feed ration is the same as last year but with more boss incorperated because they pick these seeds out above everything else and the protein level is 17% so since ther like them,it cuts back on the soybean meal which they leave to eat till last.

In my own flock this year I'm expecting a 20% lower number of eggs laid by seasons end and hatchrates to be under 50% but just under that level,,we should have another 4 weeks of egg laying here before the season ends so some levels may increase which we always hope for.But the forecast is for rain everyday this week again with high humidity. Part of the problem is new birds in with new hens for the first time. Some pens such as my Taupes have adjusted well to each other while my peach male chases the two bssp hens most every nite I'm out doing chores,,thus I'm sure is why the egg count here is really low.

 

[AugeredIn]

If you hatch 50% of the total number of eggs laid you are doing fantastic.

How many eggs laid are you averaging per hen?