IT HAPPENED!!!

[junior67]

Omg this is amazing! You got 4 new layers all so close together, they are all the egg crew now! I bet your egg basket is getting full now! There is a gorgeous assortment of colors there. Fajita's egg is so neat!!!! Congrats!!!!!!

yes it is! LOL I got 26 last week and Ditzy only laid 2, Fajita 1 and Annabelle took 4days in a row off so only laid 2. I love how most of the tan/brown are all slightly different. The closest are Ditzy and Annabelles. Will be interesting to see what Fajita's end up like or if they stay that speckled!

and yes the last 4 all with in 2 weeks of each other!

 

[junior67]

WOOOOO!!!! Now you can start the count for hatching her babies!!!! This is so exciting!

I am trying to figure out when to start hatching them and collecting them. No answers on that post yet though. My new babies come in about 6 weeks so not sure if I should wait or try and see how her eggs are in 3 weeks and get an incubator and try then. Or if I will wait and see if someone goes broody in the spring?

 

[junior67]

They are for sure staying with me. I adore them all. Here's some update pics! They had a nice swim and were preening themselves View attachment 3015779View attachment 3015780View attachment 3015781View attachment 3015782View attachment 3015783

They are still so adorable!!!!!!!!! My daughter went with me to get supplies for the chicken coop and has decided she doesn't want ducks as that is too much and too much work. haahaaa!

 

[MochaLatte]

They are BEAUTIFUL! Did the one with the "girl bill" turn out to be a girl???

Well they are just now 6 weeks old... some are still getting their voices. The "girl bill" is DEFINITELY a girl! I think a couple more that had dark bills at hatch are also girls... but still not totally sure. I love how they are growing!

 

[MochaLatte]

They are still so adorable!!!!!!!!! My daughter went with me to get supplies for the chicken coop and has decided she doesn't want ducks as that is too much and too much work. haahaaa!

They are so sweet compared to the chickens... but I tell you what, I won't have baby ducks in winter again. They really need the outside space to not become raging mess babies hahaha

 

[MochaLatte]

yes it is! LOL I got 26 last week and Ditzy only laid 2, Fajita 1 and Annabelle took 4days in a row off so only laid 2. I love how most of the tan/brown are all slightly different. The closest are Ditzy and Annabelles. Will be interesting to see what Fajita's end up like or if they stay that speckled!

and yes the last 4 all with in 2 weeks of each other!

I absolutely love this!

 

[MochaLatte]

I am trying to figure out when to start hatching them and collecting them. No answers on that post yet though. My new babies come in about 6 weeks so not sure if I should wait or try and see how her eggs are in 3 weeks and get an incubator and try then. Or if I will wait and see if someone goes broody in the spring?

Hmmm... well her eggs are a pretty decent size already, I would think after 3 weeks it would be okay but I'm not sure either... I am just excited to see her babies LOL

 

[junior67]

Hmmm... well her eggs are a pretty decent size already, I would think after 3 weeks it would be okay but I'm not sure either... I am just excited to see her babies LOL

ya they are already the size of Annabelle's eggs, well her 2nd and 3rd egg. But I would have to start collecting them Wed in order to have 2 weeks of eggs to set...... so only after 6 days from her first egg. Guess if I get a bad hatch rate I can always try again.

so looks like I am buying an incubator and going to try to set some eggs. I am getting the one you recommended. How hard was it to calibrate and keep the humidity etc. I am so scared to do that! LOL Any advice you can give me on that incubator would be great!

 

[MochaLatte]

ya they are already the size of Annabelle's eggs, well her 2nd and 3rd egg. But I would have to start collecting them Wed in order to have 2 weeks of eggs to set...... so only after 6 days from her first egg. Guess if I get a bad hatch rate I can always try again.

so looks like I am buying an incubator and going to try to set some eggs. I am getting the one you recommended. How hard was it to calibrate and keep the humidity etc. I am so scared to do that! LOL Any advice you can give me on that incubator would be great!

Maybe since she didn't start laying until she was more mature she won't have a huge difference in egg size... thats how it has happened with Raisin. Her first egg was 63g and she regularly lays around 70g now. Not a big difference.

The incubator is SUPER EASY. It's easy to set up and just let it run for a day or two before you place the eggs. It comes preset for chicken eggs. It will be set on 21 days, and 99.5°F. When it's time to add eggs(and you've spent a day or two with it running) you can easily reset the "days-countdown" to 21 for the eggies.

When you first set it up you will add water only to the "A" section. It is nice because you add water externally without having to open the incubator. I used a cup to pour in, but a turkey baster or similar would work well, too. The "B" section for water will be covered with a red insert, and you won't use it until lockdown - if you even need it then. I found that filling the "A" section to 2/3 full gave me about 50% humidity inside the incubator.

The built-in humidity reader was spot on(for mine). The temperature was off by about 1°F, and temperature is kind of a big deal. That's why it's good to have a couple extra thermometers in there to see how accurate it is from the factory. I believe the best reader of temp would be an older style mercury thermometer like you'll find for a fish aquarium or reptile terrarium. Might be good to set one of those inside during your testing days to see how it reads.

I got a two pack of thermometer/hydrometer combos(it was lkke $5 for the 2 pack) that I had set inside to see how they read in comparison to the built in ones. I got them on Amazon... there are probably(definitely) better ones out there, but I didn't have any issue with the cheap ones. I kept them in the incubator until lockdown just to spot check temp in different spots. I found that the incubator is really quite good at temp and humidity consistency.

The auto-turner for the eggs is *awesome*. It turns them every hour, I believe. It just kind of rolls them a little each time in the same direction, counter-clockwise.

I'm trying to think of what else... OH! At lockdown, you take out the auto-turner tray... at that time, I cut and put down a piece of the foam shelf-liner that you'd use to stop items from moving around in drawers. The kind that has small holes so air still moves through. It helps newly hatched chicks from slipping on the plastic and having splay-leg problems.

Please keep us updated as you collect and place eggs! And let me know if you need any help during incubator set up or if you have any questions that I missed out on here. So excited for you!!!

 

[junior67]

I have gotten 15 eggs in the last 3 days from my 7 girls!! Rosie is on a roll with 6 in a row!!!!!! Poor Marshmallow laid yesterday morning then last night (had to go back and watch the camera to figure out what happened when I noticed an egg on the poop board when looking at the coop cam today) around 10 she got very unsettled on the roost. then turned around flapping her wings etc. and you see an egg go bouncing on the poop boards! it was a shell less egg (which makes sense since she had laid a normal egg 12 hrs or so before). Hummer and Nugget are starting to pick up with a few days in a row. Fajita is every other day but has only laid a couple so we will see. Ditzy did her first, a day off then 2 days in a row, then a day off she laid her 4th today. Not sure if she will lay tomorrow or Thurs. I will start collecting hers starting with her next egg to see if any hatch. Thinking the most I will get is 10 eggs? but could be as few as 7. so guess we see.

Annabelle is still all kinds of messed up. she had 4 days off but funny thing is she goes in the box 2 days in a row then takes a day off...... then back in 2 days in a row... she did just have 2 days in a row off but as always went in the box on the first day off but doesn't lay. LOL then the next day she doesn't go in at all.... so who knows maybe she will figure it out soon.

5 weeks and 3 or 4 days till the new babies are here! And hopefully 5 weeks 1 day till some eggs hatch! They will go in the incubator in 2 weeks 1 day! that should help the time pass fast!