JANUARY HATCH-A-LONG come join in

[Madcap621]

thank you, Thank You, THANK YOU Save th' Favs for your wise advice on day 7!

Today was day 14 and I candled again. 12 filling dark eggs and 3 definite "maybes"

9 clear or cloudy, 3 ? 'early quitters'?, 1 w/maybe a blood ring?

I culled & re-candled the 12 culls, made notes and opened. 11 infertiles and an early quitter w/ a blood ring!! NO deaths of viables!

So, lock down is Friday and I have 12 probably viables and 3 maybes [which I will leave unless they start to weep or stink!]

New resolution! In future hatches, I will candle days 10 and 18 ONLY [

] Cull as appropriate on day 18 before lockdown, then keep HANDS OFF

until hatch complete!! I mean it! I'm not kidding! REALLY!!!

 

[blessedchickenmama7]

Madcap,

Good luck with that candling plan. I can not do that. I think i am a serial candler...

 

[chickenmeadow]

Madcap621: Thank yourself ...... for making good judgement & exercising your choice to fight the natural human urge to "be curious" & "do something." I too have to anounce out loud my vows to "not do"; my dear hubby is usually the one that has to hear it. I entrust him with this info, because he never forgets, that rascal. Happy to hear you have so many hopefulls!

Someone asked about what to do with button quail. Well, we used to have quite a few of them. When we had 2 large aviaries of 400 ea fancy breeder cockatiels & other aviaries of quakers, lovebirds, keets, finches, etc., we always kept button quail, as they were great at cleaning up the bird seed that dropped to the floors. They were always so sweet, prolific & cute to see.

 

[PandoraTaylor]

Congratulations

Mine go into lockdown 24th and the 30th!

 

[newchickens2009]

HELLO ONE AND ALL. I JUST CAME ACCROSS THIS AMAZING POST AND WOULD LOVE TO JOIN IN. I HAVE R.I.R., E.E., WHITE LEGHORNS AND A FEW SUPRISE EGGS IN MY BATOR. HAD A FEW PROBLEMS WITH POWER OUTAGES ON DAY 1 AND 3. KEEPING MY FINGERS CROSSED AND HOPING FOR THE BEST? I WILL CANDLE AND CULL ON DAY 18 WHICH IS THURSDAY THE 21ST. THIS IS ONLY MY SECOND TIME INCUBATING AND I AM LEARNING HAS I GO AND GETTING GREAT ADVICE AND A LOT OF HELP FROM ALL OF YOU GREAT PEOPLE HERE ON BYC. THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH!! CAN'T WAIT TO SEE HOW MANY I GET ON SUNDAY!!!!!

 

[txmel]

lockdown has started. 5 eggs all with great development and movement. now the hard part of waiting for chickies, i keep going and looking with the flashlight through the window its so had waiting and not being able to do anything at this point. all the days up to now had something to do with either turning and/or adjusting the humidity, now its just wait and watch

so stressful. i keep hopeing with each hatch that this part gets easier but so far no luck
good luck to everyone i'll keep ya all posted

 

[catwalk]

Hey all you January hatchers with staggered eggs! I just stumbled across a problem, and although I cannot presume that it is a universal concern, I want to share this precaution. I have had two weeks straight of 0% hatches, and I believe my problem is in record keeping. I consulted my incubation list to see which eggs go into lockdown today; list tells me to move the silver- starred eggs to the hatcher. That's odd, I put the silver ones in lockdown last week, all I have are eggs marked with red and blue.....

The eggs I threw out last were suppossed to lock down today, and therein lie the reason they didn't hatch! Alas, they are in the garden now, and all I have are eggs that were supposed to hatch last week, and next week's babies. Since the color method has not been working for me, I will now number them -- the lower numbered eggs go into the hatcher on the designated day. Hopefully, this will prove foolproof, as I mastered counting quite a while ago.

Kids, stay in school!

 

[The Sheriff]

Well my January hatch is officially over. I got 2 chicks out of the 6 eggs sold to me as Ameraucanas. One is definitely an EE, though. So my hatch rate on that bunch was 33%. One was infertile and two very early quitters, one I tossed early for weeping. I kept all the other eggs until today because I couldn't see through them. So if I am extra, extra lucky and they both are girls I will have succeeded in my goal of adding a couple of blue and green layers to my flock.

If they are boys, Craigslist.

On my BLRWs from Janie Marie all 6 hatched! She sent two extras and I discarded two along the way after candling. So my hatch rate for Janie's eggs is 75%! Every egg locked down hatched. One is struggling and I am preparing my self to lose him. He had that open umbilicus deal with the squishy bottom. He was among the three that hatched overnight so perhaps he got roughhoused out of the shell before he was ready. There really isn't a lot of room for chicks to move around in the Brinsea. He is resting comfortably in the warm incubator and we'll just let him rest.

So I have 5 BLRW's and 2 Am/EE's in the brooder. Here are the little darlings!

 

[blessedchickenmama7]

Quote:
Bless your heart! At least it's figured out now and will get better from here.

 

[JanieMarie]

Quote:
Oh Mary that is Wonderful!! I've been sittin on pins and needles here wondering how it went and that's not comfortable!! What colors did you get? Any splash?