June Hatch-A-Long

400

Gloria hatched 6 out of 8. When she got up to eat I candled the last eggs. One infertile and one obvious quitter. Of course when I brought out the camera 4 tucked back under mom. But two sweet faces stayed out for a photo. :)
 

Gloria hatched 6 out of 8. When she got up to eat I candled the last eggs. One infertile and one obvious quitter. Of course when I brought out the camera 4 tucked back under mom. But two sweet faces stayed out for a photo.
smile.png

So cute!!!!
 
Well my first ever hatching experience is under my belt. I've learned so much the past few weeks. Not knowing the struggles that go along with shipped eggs I had bought 4 dozen+ eggs off of eBay, from 2 different sellers. A dozen Americauca, 14 silver laced Wyandottes, and 24 silver sebrights. Right away I realized the sebright eggs were a mess to begin with- they were packaged sloppily and just looked "off." I went ahead and set all the eggs, but pulled the sebrights about 10 days in. Of the remaining eggs 10 Wyandottes and 3 americaunas hatched. A fourth americauna pipped but over 48 hours did not progress. I took all of the other chicks out of the incubator and let him sit a while, but he started to smell weird and looked gray, even though he was still moving and peeping. I realized it was time for things to happen with him one way or the other, so I helped him along a bit. He was definitely not in any shape to live, so I culled I him. :( The other eggs showed no sign of life when candled so that was that. The other 13 are super cute, though one is not able to walk. I think I'll give him until tomorrow and then decide what to do. So for a first time and shipped eggs I got a 50% hatch and am pretty happy!
 
congrats on all the new peeps today, so exciting. I couldn't help but candle again, I pulled two clears, and one more blood ring, I'm down to 9, with 2 potential blood rings among them, but I'm holding out hope, today is day 11, past the half way point

edit, I pulled those 3 eggs, and all of a sudden, within an hour my temp jumped from 102 to 103 *still air* so I've opened it up a bit, but I wonder why
 
Last edited:
OK guys, this is only somewhat related to a June hatch, but too cute not to share with everyone. OK May 15 or 16 I got an order of 16 turkeys--8 blue slate and 8 black Spanish and 5 brown leg horns from cackle hatchery. Then on the 18th I hatched 13 of my own eggs and was brooding them all together. By the second day 5 of the black Spanish turkeys died...just wobbled about and couldn't stand and then would die...so I called cackle and they gave me a refund on 4 turkeys. Then another black Spanish died...then a blue slate blah blah blah...they just kept dying and another blue slate was dead this morning now I have 5 blue slate and 2 black spanish. So 9 out of 16 dead is rough especially when I have never had a brooder death before. And this is not my first time with poults...
Anyway I have 2 brooders. One is our old duck coop that just sits on the ground, and another is an actual brooder box that is inside the building that is under adult chickens coop, and in the indoor brooder I have the 17 chicks I just hatched June 8th. And I was thinking that while last year's turkeys and chicks had no issues being brooded on the ground maybe these turkeys do---maybe these turkeys can't handle the true outside brooder... but then I was worried about putting month old turkeys in with 5 day old chicks. I mean that is a super huge size difference, but let's face it turkeys are crazy expensive and I hatch around 20 of these chick's every 3 weeks...so I figured I would try it anyway and if a chick got squished I would just move the small chicks in with the larger chicks. But turkeys are usually pretty laid back poultry. Not prone to pecking on each other so I was thinking they would be alright together even with the huge difference in size...

Then tonight I went out again to check on them and this is what I found...

400

400

400


Looks to me like the chicks are loving their new turkey mattresses, and the turkeys seem to be loving their new blanket made of chicks... how stinking cute is that? It's like the turkeys know if they are on top of the pile they will squish the chicks, and perhaps the chicks know these turkeys seem to want to be far warmer than they should need with the amount of feathers they have... either way if I don't lose anymore turkeys then I will know I have fixed the issue at least for now. And I will also have learned that while brooding 4 week old baby chicks along with 5 day old chicks is a recipe for disaster month old poults and 5 day old chicks can be the best of friends. Lol
 
Last edited:
I have one of the baby ducks in the brooder now. Still sleepy from me helping it out. It's trying to get up on it's legs, and it wriggles that little tail like a big duck..so cute! That little chick was lonely until the I put the duck in, it snuggles right up to it now. :)
Cute babies! What is the bedding on the ground? It looks good. I tried pine and it gets in the food and water. So I just used brown paper. Not too good.
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom