I must have lost a few of the brain cells that store my egg incubation information since last year...
This is the fourth year we have hatched eggs (our own or someone else's). I've always had an easy time seeing the blood vessels early on, then eyes shortly thereafter, so I know what's fertile and developing, and what's clear.
I set 4 dozen eggs last Sunday. I used to be able to detect life sometimes by day 3, almost always day 5 (except for dark brown eggs, which you just have to wait and wait). Well, last night was the end of day 4, and I saw NOTHING but a couple of meat spots in one egg. No vessels. No eyes. No layering of the yolks. Mind you, they got up to 104.7 for an hour, and then another high bump at 102.2 for a couple of hours, all in the first 24 hours. I figured they were par cooked so I wasn't really expecting any to live.
So, I decide I'm just going to crack them all open and make a giant scramble to give back to the flock tomorrow as long as nothing smelled or looked off.
I crack egg #1. It's infertile with meat spots. As expected.
I crack egg #2. Ooooooops...nice blood vessels and a 1/4" embryo, and I just killed it. <insert expletives of your choice here>
So I decide to look at them all again (like I did on days 3 and 4), and while I still can't see any blood vessels, I saw a couple of dark eyes, and did notice the yolk starting to settle into layers of different shades. Also saw a few definite clears, but left them alone anyway for another couple of days. My "definite" isn't very! Out of practice after 10 months off, I guess.
Short story long, I guess/hope they mostly made it.
It's a big mix of Bielefelders and several colors of English Orps, as well as some genetic testing eggs from one hen (eggs from my other "maybe" black lav split hen are being collected now for the next batch). These two hens are from Cogburn and my blues, a little last minute thing I did in my very last hatch in 2015. Cogburn is split to lav, so the only way to know if these are "true black" or "black split to lav" was to breed them to Roadrunner, the lavender roo I got from @jchny2000 . If I get all black chicks, this will prove the hen is true black. Otherwise, if I get even one lavender chick, I'll know the hen is split like their daddy. I hope I have at least one true black, and would be happy if both were.
ALL I can figure is that the shells on these eggs are thicker than average. Most of the eggs are from hens 9-12 months old. But previously my young hens never had such thick shells (not overly thick, just strong). We started feeding some dry cat food to the whole flock, breeders and layers, about a year ago, and maybe that's what has changed the egg quality. We let the older birds molt, and their eggs are more "perfect" than before the molt, but the only eggs in the bator now from hens that molted are about half a dozen blue Orp eggs.
So I offer up thanks to the Chicken God and hope these chicks hatch healthy.
ONE QUESTION: Anybody still waiting on a hen or two to resume laying? I moved my one and only known black English Orp into a comfortable crate in the garage to get rid of Jubilee roo residue, but she hasn't laid an egg yet. Cleo was a superb layer last year. Maybe she's just off because she's away from the flock. My chocolate hen went on egg strike for 5 days after I put a rooster in with her, but she's back to laying.
They are getting plenty of light (the garage clan of four).
I also just had a really great day, one of those you'd like to put in a bottle and keep as a tonic for the rough days. With my back and leg pain, a great day is a real rarity--plus interactions with Humanity were all just superb, with total strangers. And my daughter also made me extremely proud by handling herself like a responsible adult (she's 21) in a touchy situation when two other MUCH older adults did nothing to try to improve it (the situation has been going on about 7 weeks, and was getting worse by the week). I talked her through how I would approach it, including killing her supervisor with kindness, and by golly she executed it beautifully today, and got the desired results. Communication. Realizing that they have different styles and that has made things difficult for both of them, but they never talked about it before. It's good to talk to people. My daughter is still used to being deferential to her elders (especially people old enough to be her parents and grandparents), but I told her she could be respectful but still speak with them as one adult to another.
Night night, everyone!
I mainly just enjoy studying animals and would like to work with them for a living. No clue what I'll be doing, but ideally it'll involve animals. I also may be minoring in German now because my professor really wants me to, and I've already gone through all my gen ed classes so I need something to pad out my semesters anyway. I go to IPFW, but my degree will be from Purdue University. 
(The cuteness, ACK! I do not need to check on Margie's eggs at 11 at night!!)
