I have a breeding/hatching question:
I have lavs, blacks and blues from P. Smith. One black hen and one lav. The rest were Roos. One of the hens started laying about 6 weeks ago. They were great looking from day one but very small. I assumed they were from the lav b/c she is very petite and I beleive smith lavs have bantam in the background.
We set 8 of her eggs Nov 25th. I had one pip but in the middle of the egg and turned almost 180 degrees from the air cell. I wasn't home to help and we lost it. The other one to pip only made it internally, in the same malposition and the others died very soon before that.
It was my first incubation so very sad and demoralizing. I checked the two that pipped, which is how I know the positions were oriented wrong. However the chicks were in the right placement body wise with head tucked under the wing and ready to pip.
Both chicks were perfectly formed, absorbed the yolk and the external pipped one was ready to come out, with blood veins not visible etc only had a slightly large naval still (not sure if this is deformity?)
My questions are this:
1: did the small egg size prevent proper positioning to air cell? Membranes were not shrink wrapped and air cells were proper size.
2: Both chicks were dark black/blue feathers with yellow feather spots... So, according to black x lav breeding this should not be possible. Were they blue x lav? Or must these eggs be from the black hen? Splits black x blue are supposed to be all yellow at hatch, correct?
Thanks for any advice or ideas!!!
Sorry to hear about your bad first hatch. My first hatch, I got nothing, so don't give up! There are so many factors involved in hatching, that it is difficult to know exactly what went wrong, although experience is the best teacher.
I can tell you that I have one hen who's eggs will not hatch without assistance (not an Ameraucana, though). I have tried three different hatches with her eggs. It is as though the chick grows too big for the egg and can't finish zipping. The chick dies in the egg. My last hatch, I went in after 24 hours and completed the zip and the resulting hen appears perfectly healthy, but I am not going to try hatching this particular hen's eggs anymore.
The small egg size may or may not have caused your problem.
Sorry I can't answer the chick down question.