Incubator brands and hatching vs live chicks..thoughts?

[Kelster65]

Hi all, I've been reading some posts on the subject but some are rather old. What are your thoughts of buying
guaranteed sexed chicks/ ducks vs. Incubating your own? I will be purchasing pullets (no rooster) but was thinking of incubating my own duck eggs as they should be fertilized.



What is a good brand of incubator for a dozen or less eggs?

Thank you!

 

[nuthatched]

If you can't have a rooster, you need to set atleast double the eggs, since half will be male. Hatcheries can only say their sexing is 90% accurate at best so there's a slim chance of receiving a cockerel. I've always gotten what I ordered. How many birds do you want? Some hatcheries are better than others for small orders.

 

[ExoticPetOwner]

Purchasing them based on gender guarantees that you will end up with mostly chicks or ducklings of that certain gender you wanted and of that certain amount. Incubating has a lot more involved than purchasing the already incubated chicks/ducklings. You may end up with an odd amount of chicks or ducklings with all different genders when you incubate or purchase from a hatchery. Even if you ordered no roosters/cockerels. Which is problematic because the female to male ratio is 1 drake for every 5-6+ female ducks and for chickens it's 1 rooster for every 9+ hens. In my opinion, purchasing from a hatchery is better for genetic reasons, breeding reasons, behavioral/gender reasons among the poultry themselves, and liability reasons if you ever want to sell those babies, which is also attached to the genetic reasons. Hatching your own babies is fun! However, it's better to get more of a diversity in genetics so no babies you hatch come out with any complications. It also helps with the hatch rate when there's less "incest" I guess you can call it. That might make more sense to get an idea of inbreeding if you're not sure what it is. Inbreeding among ducks isn't a problem till it happens over multiple generations, which isn't a problem when you're only selling as a small farm/business or having them just for yourself.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

incest

Word you're looking for is Inbreeding.

 

[Kelster65]

Thank you! I've wanted to order chick's for diversity in my flock and have more control over gender and that's probably the way to go. I could have a rooster here but didn't really see a reason to have one since I was primarily raising for eggs. I got unsexed ducklings last year and luckily only ended up with one drake to 5 females. I am not planning to harvest males, but that might be a reality if I ended up incubating my own duck eggs. Thank you all for helping me gather my thoughts. I can spend money on building a better/bigger brooder than an incubator this year.



Inbreeding is a concern too since I plan to sell chick's at some point and gene diversity comes first.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Thank you! I've wanted to order chick's for diversity in my flock and have more control over gender and that's probably the way to go. I could have a rooster here but didn't really see a reason to have one since I was primarily raising for eggs. I got unsexed ducklings last year and luckily only ended up with one drake to 5 females. I am not planning to harvest males, but that might be a reality if I ended up incubating my own duck eggs. Thank you all for helping me gather my thoughts. I can spend money on building a better/bigger brooder than an incubator this year.



Inbreeding is a concern too since I plan to sell chick's at some point and gene diversity comes first.

Unlike humans, birds can have quite a bit of inbreeding before issues start to come up. It's very common when working to establish a certain trait

 

[ladyh]

If you're concerned about inbreeding,just use one roo and keep track of the hen he is mounting.. If you have one roo, use the offspring to hatch that would be like father to grand daugher or grand son..same concept in breeding goats. You would want father to dauther and father to aunt father to other siblings to keep the line but NOT bother sister, that is where the problems CAN occur..Linebreeding vs inbreeding...Wild birds don't stay in one place so the chance of inbreeding is quite rare, same with wild goats, they spread around and diverse to different areas.

 

[mcdze]

well, to start your flock buying quality breed chicks from a supplier is probably about the best move you could make .. local farm stores alot of times get chicks locally that can have a challenged gene pool to say the least .. but your flock 'will' need to be replenished from time to time, everything loves chicken they say, and they get old and dont lay as good after a couple of years .. so an incubator can keep you rolling for about the cost of one batch of supplier chicks shipped .. if course youll need to keep a rooster, aaand its nice to know some people that will take your extra chickes to ... i recommend a larger incubator, like 24 egg+, fully automatic, larger ones are more stable and less finicky... i use a cheaper ebay one, leave that choice on you, some people swear by the more expensive ones ...

 

[HennyPenny44]

I use the Kebonnixs incubator. Fits a dozen chicken eggs and about 8-10 duck eggs. It maintains a very good even temperature and humidity. I just incubated some duck eggs I got off of eBay. Of the 6 that were fertile, all developed fully but 2 were malpositioned and died at hatch time while 4 came out healthy. Unfortunately, I think I got 1 girl and 3 boys based on bill sexing so I ordered 4 females from a hatchery to balance things out and start my duck flock. I’ll be giving away all but one of the boys hopefully when the time comes. Two years ago, I incubated chicken eggs in the same incubator and got 2 boys and 6 girls luckily with only one not hatching, and I haven’t had to buy from a hatchery since then. I plan to use my incubator for small batches of eggs for myself to replenish my flock and get a larger incubator to sell ducklings in the future. I don’t need that many chicks at a time anymore but hatcheries are good if you need a lot of females at once or if you want a variety of breeds.

 

[5 Points Wingfeather]

Just dropping in to say that I really like the Kebonnix as well. My most recent hatch is going on right now. Set 12 eggs, 11 made it to lockdown and i have 7 healthy baby chicks and 3 good looking pips so far. I imagine I’ll hatch 10-11 out of the 12. It’s automatic egg turner and thermostat seems to be calibrated correctly