JANUARY 2015 Hatch-A-Long

[carcar80]

Carcar80...  Fabulous hatch rate!  Give yourself a pat on the back.   What kind of incubator?

Thanks!! Believe it or not I use two LG still-airs. The older model I use to incubate, and the newer model for a hatcher. LOVING the new model.. No more curious chicks pecking at the heating element and stressing me out!

 

[carcar80]

The muff/beard baby.. Just can't get over him/her lol:

 

[Renee572]

The muff/beard baby.. Just can't get over him/her lol:

so cute.

 

[ChickenLady2014]

Super-cute!

Aww how sweet, they will be little fluffy butts soon.

 

[Purpletie3]

Beautiful chick!

 

[howfunkyisurchicken]

Love those puffy cheeks, I just wanna pinch them!

 

[Renee572]

Alright, weighed my eggs this morning on day 10 but before I did I decided to candle the 9 clears/unknowns we had and toss the clears. I know it doesn't hurt to keep the clears but it's less turning and weighing I have to do. Upon candling I found 6 for sure clears (opened them up and they were indeed not fertile) and 3 with chicks (or at least I think)... 2 I could see movement and the last one is an olive colored egg that is so hard to see in but I could see veins at the top so I figure that's a good sign.

As far as weighing, my eggs didn't fair so well. Out of the 22 I have left in there 10 of them did not lose any weight at all from day 7 to day 10, 3 lost too much or were still down from last weighing, 1 lost a bit too much and 8 lost the correct amount. In my haste I added hot water to bump up the humidity thinking I had it too low when I kept seeing the weights the same as last time. After I sat down I realized I made a mistake and no or less than ideal weight loss equals too much humidity! Darn it.... I'm off to go try to remove the water from my incubator now.

Good news is we have 3 more chicks then we knew we had on Sunday!!

 

[howfunkyisurchicken]

Alright, weighed my eggs this morning on day 10 but before I did I decided to candle the 9 clears/unknowns we had and toss the clears. I know it doesn't hurt to keep the clears but it's less turning and weighing I have to do. Upon candling I found 6 for sure clears (opened them up and they were indeed not fertile) and 3 with chicks (or at least I think)... 2 I could see movement and the last one is an olive colored egg that is so hard to see in but I could see veins at the top so I figure that's a good sign.

As far as weighing, my eggs didn't fair so well. Out of the 22 I have left in there 10 of them did not lose any weight at all from day 7 to day 10, 3 lost too much or were still down from last weighing, 1 lost a bit too much and 8 lost the correct amount. In my haste I added hot water to bump up the humidity thinking I had it too low when I kept seeing the weights the same as last time. After I sat down I realized I made a mistake and no or less than ideal weight loss equals too much humidity! Darn it.... I'm off to go try to remove the water from my incubator now.

Good news is we have 3 more chicks then we knew we had on Sunday!!

3 more chicks than expected is a very good thing! Good luck removing the water, at least you still have plenty of time to get them sorted out

 

[howfunkyisurchicken]

So, final count for me looks to be 5 EEs and 2 Silkies. 2 of the EEs are still absorbing blood/yolk, but I had to remove the shell from their eggs because they both pipped at the wrong end of the egg. I took out all the left over eggs and candled them, then eggtopsied them (2 Silkie, 5 EE). They had all passed. The one Silkie egg I thought had quit before lock down had, indeed, quit. One of the EEs was in the right position, made its way through the internal membrane but was too large to be able to move enough to pip through the shell. If I would have checked them last night, I probably could have saved it, but thats the way it goes sometimes. The rest of the eggs were all malpositioned. Maybe because I didn't turn them the first 4 days, or my low temperature during the beginning stages? I don't know, but I'm happy I have chicks in my bator! I'll post pics of everyone when they're fluffy and in the brooder

For my first go with shipped eggs, I'm pretty pleased with myself after reading all of the horror stories about them!

 

[Purpletie3]

How funky...congrats! Great job on your shipped eggs!

@Renee...glad to see good progress! Can't wait for your hatch date!