June Hatch-A-Long

[MAchick73]

Day 2 of lock down starts tonight and I just saw an egg wiggle!! So exciting!!

 

[missnu01]

Woo hoo!

 

[Melissa F]

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...

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

Oh my goodness that is the CUTEST!

 

[missnu01]

Hopefully it will keep the remaining turkeys alive. Out of all the ones that started doing badly I was only able to save one. It is still alive, but I tried with almost all of them... brought them in wrapped them in a heating pad and would keep harassing them with food until they would eat on their own... it's like one day one will just be really skinny and within a couple of days or hours dead. So I check them all each day and if one is feeling thinner it gets the heating pad food harassment, but like I said only one recovered from looking all droopy and I stayed up all night feeding it with a syringe... of course when I brought that one in it was one of 2. The one was eating and drinking on its own in the morning, the other was still laying there like it was too tired to swallow. I tried giving them all a round of corid, giving them poultry vitamins, egg yolks, sugar water, everything I could think of...but even if I managed to get them to eat on their own for a bit they would still end up dead except the one... I don't know what is going on except I will never order turkeys from cackle again. Last year I got turkeys from them and they did great. All lived into adulthood, this year at this point if one makes it I will be surprised. I will also be rather upset if the only ones left end up to be males as well. I need at least one to be female and I will guard it like nothing else and hatch more turkeys as soon as it lays an egg... but that's only if any survive and if a survivor is a female. And it's like they are doing great until they really really aren't one day hopping around next day dead, or just all droopy and can't keep their eyes open. Except the one that made it. It was actually droopy a couple of days before I decided to try and help it. I was becoming resigned to the fact that they were soon to die after becoming lethargic. But that one made it.

 

[blkjak]

Well first pip the chick died. Movement last night but not this morning. Just opened egg carefully and chick was dead. Not sure what happened. I have five more pipping now. 1 pipped on the bottom and 1 on the side. Next time I incubate banty eggs I will stop turning at day 15 to see if that helps.

 

[MAchick73]

Oh that's so sad
I have my first pip! I think I heard chirping too. Im so nervous!

 

[blkjak]

2 silkies out and healthy. 4 more have pipped. The action is fast and furious. Hopefully all the silkies/bantams hatch before the EEs start.

 

[jlynnp]

Here is my lone Partridge Penedenesecna Chick who I names Cheepers

 

[Joplus]

Here is my lone Partridge Penedenesecna Chick who I names Cheepers

Cute! Your bator looks like mine with the chicken and quail mixed. Are you expecting them to hatch at the same time? Here's mine before I took out all the clear/dead eggs.

 

[jlynnp]

Cute! Your bator looks like mine with the chicken and quail mixed. Are you expecting them to hatch at the same time? Here's mine before I took out all the clear/dead eggs.

I have varied hatch dates, 3 infact. I move the ones due to hatch to the incubator I use as a hatcher.