June Hatch-A-Long

[StormsnSaugeye]

I'm doing an accidental hatch of a suspected mallard duckling. Long story short I found a nest partially destroyed but with some warm eggs. 2 of them really. One died within hours (Still in egg. About day 24 it seemed) but the other one was still viable. It's now day 28 (estimate) and it's been nearly 48 hours since it pipped externally. I did a gentle check of the membrane and it's showing blood slowly receding and the duckling is chirping. But as is typical, he's just taking his sweet time getting out.

Since I live on a lake, occasionally I take care of the occasional orphan until I can either find it a surrogate (They're generally imprinted on other ducks so it's a matter of finding a mother with her ducklings who will accept the poor thing) or a local amish family volunteers to take it in.

However with this one... I feel a certain attachment so I'm gonna keep this one this time. I've raised ducks in the past. So I'm well prepared.

But as usual the waiting and trying to figure out if it's gonna be a quick hatch or a tedious hatch is always a pain.

Bright side is that with this whole covid thing I have all the time in the world to raise the duckling.

 

[FortCluck]

ERMAHGERD....I've got little spidery embryos y'all!!
Lots and lots of little red spidery babies to be...

Of 22 eggs-
18 were clearly veined, most with tiny blobs.
2 were super thick and spotty shelled. I think I saw veins but not quite sure yet. (SG hen #1)
2 were...I dunno, hard to see anything. Smooth but also a thicker shell (SG hen #2)
Each egg has it's own ID and detailed notes beginning from the day it was laid.

Ok, guys...how the heck do you-
Hold the camera, get the camera to focus, block the escaping light from around the edges, not drop the egg, and take a picture all at once??
I tried to get a few candle shots, but there has to be a better way!

You hold the egg and the flashlight in one hand and take a pic with the other

 

[Offshoreorca]

My seven BCM eggs are on Day 7 - yay! Tomorrow I will give them a candle and see if I can see anything developing through the shells. This will be my first dark egg hatch, so hopefully all goes well. This will also be my last new breed for the year I think.... My Salmon Faverolles are off heat and outside now, and my Wheaten Ameraucanas are just over a week old. They'll join the Silkies and Cochins to make a motley crew.

 

[SnapdragonQ]

I hatched out some copper marans for the Easter HAL, I sold 2 pullets to my neighbor that really wanted 2 (I wanted to keep 2....but figured if I could sell them, then I had an excuse to hatch more. Lol!) I let her pick her 2 and the one that got to stay with me is the absolute sweetest little pullet! She loves attention and always wants to be pet or held! I have never had a chicken that likes to be handled as much as her! Then one of the cockerels also likes attention. He is going to be a ladies man as he is already strutting his stuff and showing off for the girls at only 6 weeks old. I can't wait to see if the next hatch of BCM is that friendly!

Aww, they sound wonderful!

Neck strap for the camera, get it ready to take pictures before you start candling and I always keep a nice soft towel in front of the incubator to place the eggs so there aren't any mishaps with them rolling away.

The towel is a good idea, though I just went from bator, to the lid for candle, then back to the bator. I'm betting it's easier with a separate light I could set down on the counter next to the egg.

That’s for sure closer than BC. Haha. I’ll look into requirements for importing them and see; I’ll reach out to you if it looks doable. although with the border still closed I probably wouldn’t be looking to go that route until next spring anyways...

If I could make a trip and pick them up that would definitely be preferable. I don’t know about a week long drive to bring them back though. And again right now with the pandemic, they really don’t want us travelling out of province... Haha. Fingers crossed for you that your eggs make it ok and you wind up with adorable honkers!

My friend is a few hours south of Buffalo. Maybe in the future the drive might workout depending how far north you are.

When you figure it out, let me know I can manage the egg and light with one hand, but my phone camera almost always refuses to focus long enough to take a picture worth sharing. Just a blurry blob.

Right? Getting it to focus... and stay focused...seems to be the trick!

You hold the egg and the flashlight in one hand and take a pic with the other

The candler is on the bator lid. No flashlight. Not sure either hand is big enough anyway to hold a light and an egg at the same time

 

[StormsnSaugeye]

Quick update.
Duckling hatched.
It's currently resting in the incubator and drying out.

 

[SnapdragonQ]

Scrounged around the house and none of the flashlights I have that would fit in my hand along with an egg are as bright as the lid candler, so I made a little hood/cap to go where the candler is so light doesn't escape around the edge of the egg nor shine through the plastic housing. And, it holds the egg nice and still in any position so I can hold my camera steady to keep the focus clear.
Gotta love construction paper and painter's tape.

I tested it on a regular egg and so far so good. It's daytime though so I'll retest tonight .

 

[kelseyk]

I am preparing myself for a not so great Call Duck hatch. The Call Duck eggs arrived yesterday and instantly dreaded what I would find when I opened the box. The box was intact with no sides or corners crushed in....but the top of the box was elevated (was not flat) and the box flaps had been ripped at some point. The box was practically completely covered in packing tape. I was relieved when I opened the box and found a smaller box inside surrounded by crumpled newspaper. The bump in the box's top was being caused by a part of styrofoam egg carton that had been placed between the smaller box and the outer box. I opened the inner box to find a styrofoam egg carton surrounded by newspaper. I opened the egg carton to find the duck eggs sitting in pieces of paper towel. No broken eggs! They were dirty....which I pretty much expected as it is rare to find one of my ducks eggs clean. I lightly sanded as much stuff off as I could and looked all the eggs over good. I did find one that had a pit in it (small pin hole size hole that goes through the shell but not the membrane. I sprayed all with Hydrogen Peroxide and let set in a clean egg carton to dry. One of the eggs fizzed up pretty good....must have had some bacteria and stuff on that one. I noticed while unpacking the egg carton they sent the eggs in, that an egg had previously broke in that egg carton as there was dried egg yolk in the bottom of one of the cups. I waxed the pit on the one egg this morning and did my preliminary candle.....and OMG!!! These eggs have the absolute worst air cells I have ever seen!!! There is only 1 that has a normal/slightly jiggly air cell. The rest are sooooo bad and 1 is completely detached and just floats around in the egg when you turn it. There is one egg that the air cell goes 3/4 the way down the egg at least 2/3 the circumference of the egg and a lot of saddles and just horrid air cell shapes. I guess this batch is getting incubated upright in egg cartons in my Janoel and I will be crossing my fingers that anything hatches from these eggs.

 

[SnapdragonQ]

I am preparing myself for a not so great Call Duck hatch. The Call Duck eggs arrived yesterday and instantly dreaded what I would find when I opened the box. The box was intact with no sides or corners crushed in....but the top of the box was elevated (was not flat) and the box flaps had been ripped at some point. The box was practically completely covered in packing tape. I was relieved when I opened the box and found a smaller box inside surrounded by crumpled newspaper. The bump in the box's top was being caused by a part of styrofoam egg carton that had been placed between the smaller box and the outer box. I opened the inner box to find a styrofoam egg carton surrounded by newspaper. I opened the egg carton to find the duck eggs sitting in pieces of paper towel. No broken eggs! They were dirty....which I pretty much expected as it is rare to find one of my ducks eggs clean. I lightly sanded as much stuff off as I could and looked all the eggs over good. I did find one that had a pit in it (small pin hole size hole that goes through the shell but not the membrane. I sprayed all with Hydrogen Peroxide and let set in a clean egg carton to dry. One of the eggs fizzed up pretty good....must have had some bacteria and stuff on that one. I noticed while unpacking the egg carton they sent the eggs in, that an egg had previously broke in that egg carton as there was dried egg yolk in the bottom of one of the cups. I waxed the pit on the one egg this morning and did my preliminary candle.....and OMG!!! These eggs have the absolute worst air cells I have ever seen!!! There is only 1 that has a normal/slightly jiggly air cell. The rest are sooooo bad and 1 is completely detached and just floats around in the egg when you turn it. There is one egg that the air cell goes 3/4 the way down the egg at least 2/3 the circumference of the egg and a lot of saddles and just horrid air cell shapes. I guess this batch is getting incubated upright in egg cartons in my Janoel and I will be crossing my fingers that anything hatches from these eggs.

Sorry to hear about the rough travels of the eggs.

You mentioned waxing and I've seen several refer to waxing a crack or small hole. Is it candle wax, paraffin, or beeswax? Or none of the above? I'm curious.

One of the eggs I wanted to include in my set had a hairline crack in the shell and I didn't know it could be sealed up for possible hatch.

 

[kelseyk]

Sorry to hear about the rough travels of the eggs.

You mentioned waxing and I've seen several refer to waxing a crack or small hole. Is it candle wax, paraffin, or beeswax? Or none of the above? I'm curious.

One of the eggs I wanted to include in my set had a hairline crack in the shell and I didn't know it could be sealed up for possible hatch.

I use a plain white unscented tealight candle (I need to go buy myself a plain white tapered candle as it would be a bit easier to drip wax off of). This is the 5th egg that I have waxed. 2 of the previous 4 have hatched (without assistance), the other 2 were clears. I incubate all of my waxed eggs upright in an egg carton, but lay them on their sides for lockdown. You just have to watch during lockdown that they don't pip under the wax if it is thick. I actually take a box knife and carefully scrape part of the wax off if it is thick so that if they pip where the wax is they are more likely to get all the way through without my assistance.

 

[FortCluck]

Sorry to hear about the rough travels of the eggs.

You mentioned waxing and I've seen several refer to waxing a crack or small hole. Is it candle wax, paraffin, or beeswax? Or none of the above? I'm curious.

One of the eggs I wanted to include in my set had a hairline crack in the shell and I didn't know it could be sealed up for possible hatch.

You can use liquid band aid too