Let the showgirl odyssey begin! HATCHING 5/27 C'Mon in!!

[vfem]

You know perfectly well if my silkies go broody again, I'm in on this with you!

Right now I'm just playing with my 9 day old little fluffy butts while I wait!

 

[insiderart]

Yay! *clucks softly to self*

Well, I have an 8yo daughter, her friends, and hubs to worry about running into the incubator. I'm giving it a try right now while DD is at school, we'll see how brave I am about keeping it tilted when DD gets home!!

I must admit to candling a couple of times now on the earlier silkie eggs. I'm not sure what I saw if anything... I have now at least perfected the candling mechanism. I bought an LED penlight from WM $2.50, but it has a translucent barrel right around the bulb and this was causing an issue. So now I have wrapped a piece of black felt around the end to block the light and to also cushion the contact with the egg. I'm going to wait probably to day 7 to candle the SG eggs. I candled when they arrived to make sure there were no cracks.

Common V's sillkies you can do it! We need pics of those chicks to carry us through!

Oooo Hoof I bet you have the prettiest eggs in the incubator! Any pics of them?

 

[Suellyn]

Hiya, am gonna jump onto this thread, because am on same/similar hatch schedule... Just set 8 Buff Orpington eggs early this a.m., were much wanted shipped eggs from a breeder in PA (Hinkjc)...

Anyway, I guess that make me "due" on Fri., May 29th..

This is my 2ond hatch, my 1st hatch went great, outta 12 eggs, 2 were infertile BUT 9 out of the remaining 10 hatched & thrived. (1 died in shell around day 16 or 17...?).

Insiderart, no pecking, just another Broody hopping aboard.. *clucks to self & eggs, shuffles & turns them, looks around at other broodies..*

!!!!!!!

 

[insiderart]

I had expected my second set of SG eggs today. But no go! USPS strikes again! I just hope they come tomorrow! Luckily it's cool here today, so as long as they aren't using the box as a doorstop or something they should still be ok.

I'm so glad more people are getting on this thread. Makes it more fun... this long sit on the eggs is tough!

 

[Suellyn]

Quote:
Especially if you forget to put the pointy end DOWN....!!!!!

 

[melissastraka]

I'm joining the club! I have set 19 B/B/S Orps from EmptyNest and 6 BLRW eggs from Vicki2x2 that are due on the 26th. I had one hen go broody (yeah! first one!!!) so i set 2 B/B/S's and a BLRW under her and hope it all goes well.

This is my 2nd hatch and I love my LG...i know, I know, but i am home all day so the temp and hum thing hasnt been a problem (knock on wood) yet.

I cant wait for these to hatch...they are my wish list babies...next on the list....Lav Orps!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Paganbird]

Quote:
Time really creeps by when you're waiting for something you reeeeaaaally want! My husband finally gave in to my need for silkies. He doesn't understand why I want them since they "aren't practical & don't lay decent sized eggs." I told him that I would like to hatch a couple & that probably not all the eggs will hatch and I want at least one, maybe two. And then I bought a dozen.

I found out that the guy who sold me the silkies also has bantam Mille Fleur chickens... so I begged for a MF egg as an extra - he sent 3!
I can't complain. DH has been pretty understanding. He laughed at the size of the MF eggs. He said the silkies are going to look like "muppet rejects." He complains that I'm on this site too much...
BUT - he also talks about adding on to our coop, putting up a new run, he wants to name a silkie, and he stopped to look at TSC chicks today - "just to see what they have" - of course!

 

[insiderart]

Well my other showgirl eggs didn't arrive today. This means they will sit all weekend wherever they are. And IF they arrive Monday they will have been in the post for 7 days.

So I'm not sure they will be any good at all.

On a different note, tipping the incubator instead of tipping each egg individually continues. One interesting thing is that despite not opening the incubator the temperature fluctuates after each tip. I have to watch the temps and adjust the knob about an hour after the tip. Nonetheless, I'm sure this is a better way than opening the incubator to tip so many eggs as the temp goes way down then because it has to be open so long.

I am now designing something better to put under the incubator. I have found a chunk of styrofoam and I will be making wedges to stick under the bottom. This will offer more support and make it less tippy... (one hopes).

 

[insiderart]

My candling skills improve.... I have been candling the sillkie eggs I put in on 5/1 and 5/2.. The May 1st set didn't fare very well. I saw 2 definite blood rings and several blanks... There is one definite chick developing.. and possibly another. This was out of 9. I may have to candle them again tomorrow and take out the bad eggs.. don't want anyone blowing up in there! These eggs also exhibited a lot of detatched air cells, so no telling what happened to them.

These eggs were from very nice white silkies...

Now on the 5/2 set things are looking better! I only saw one blank and the rest seem to be cooking right along. This set could be white or splash and the parents were show quality. This set contained 9 also...

The showgirl eggs I received from JM went into the incubator on 5/6 so I won't candle those until say the 13th or 14th.. seems to be easier for me to see things by that time. There are 18 eggs in this set.. she sent lots of extras. Main issue for me is that a lot of them were marked partridge.. which isn't my favorite.. but we'll see. Maybe I'll be bowled over!

The other SG eggs that I purchased and wanted to hatch out with this 5/6 set are apparently on the world tour. I am hoping their tour bus docks Monday and I will try them anyway.

Luckily I purchased another incubator so I can lockdown the earlier set for hatching and still be turning the later sets.

 

[kristenm1975]

Hey, I've got a dozen fridge eggs under a setting hen that are supposed to hatch on the 27th. I'll keep you posted!