That one blue x blue chick is looking exceptional. Very excited to see how she turns out. Still grumbling about not getting a splash but...all in due time!
I've got 9 eggs ready to hatch on Monday, no internal pips yet, will probably all hatch on Sunday so I upped the humidity a bit. Once the humidity spikes to 70% I'll know that the chicks have pipped internally. I'm not opening that incubator again until Tuesday.
After Tuesday, I have 20 good eggs still in the incubator due to hatch the second week in April. That'll be my last hoo-rah for the year. Due to hatch are eggs from my best black cock (the half-blind Clyde) and the best white hens I have. Hoping for something awesome in this one. Because Lord knows I don't see anything spectacular coming from the white x white breedings.
I'm having to move my birds this Sunday to a friend's place. This is gonna stop all egg orders after the ones I've already promised eggs to. Sorry to those that wanted the eggs, but the place where I'm keeping them is really rubbing me the wrong way and I can't deal with it any longer. I don't like it when people steal my eggs, especially when they know I am hatching from them...
I'm Langshanless today...kills me not to be able to run out to the farm to play with them...all I have now are the babies, which I guess will have to do for the time being.
I came back from work and found 6 beautiful babies! 4 black, 1 mixed breed and 1 blue. The blue is the biggest chick I have EVER seen. It got stuck in the turner (no, I don't remove the turner because it winds up killing all of the eggs when I do AND I have a staggered hatch going on). It can't walk too well, but is at least hobbling around a bit.
There was an egg that hadn't made any progress and the chick was starting to look "gassy", so I opened the egg up and unwound the neck. It got stuck in the egg overnight (literally like glued to the egg). I opened the incubator to get it out and look at it and the stank of rotten egg hit me. It wound up being the chick in the egg. I removed the egg (no more stink) from the chick and the chick still has some absorbing to do. It's not "floppy" and it doesn't look like alot to absorb but if it will absorb it is still to be determined.
I have one more egg that I heard peeping in there for this hatch and then I'm good until another 2 weeks. It's my last hatch of the year. This was by far the best hatch I've had in years (which is just sad really). And I'm super stoked to get a chick out of Clyde. All of the chicks are white splits (save for the blue chick) so that's exciting.
I'll try and take photos in a bit once the chicks start waking up a bit.
We have "slight" walking by the blue chick!!! It's taking itty bitty steps but still awesome to see!!!!!
These chicks, I believe, are all female. One chick hatched out that had not absorbed so I didn't count it as a chick, good thing because when I came back from work it had passed in the incubator.
I have one more egg in the incubator that was supposed to hatch on Monday. Thing is...I hear scratching and pecking going on in the egg but doesn't seem to have broken into the air cell. I'm wondering if I should help it, but I know if I do it'll die. It's just such a precious egg as it's one of Clyde's chicks!