Lock down!

[wishful suburbanite]

I had a longer outage than that on day 14 (maybe up to 20 hrs) and they were at 60ish deg when it went back on. All the eggs hatched fine, just about 18 hrs later than I was expecting them to start. Don't give up!! That close to hatch they seem to be quite resilient.

B

=) Thanks. Good to hear.

I keep reading and rereading that Brinsea temperature study.

If I was going to crash and burn at this, I told myself I didn't want it to be in the late stages when there's very developed chicks in there.

But for that matter, at least they're big enough to be generating some amount of body heat and they're sitting close to each other. Hope they kept each other warm.

 

[TonysChickens]

Got 32 out of the incubator so far, 2 more no pips left.

 

[underground chickenman]

After a long 30+ hours from the first pip to first hatch (and it wasn't the first pip), they're popping like popcorn. The first pip finally hatched about 32 hours after pipping. It just pipped and sat there for a day and a half and the zipped in about 10 minutes. I guess it was just time. About half of the rest have pipped and I am just now closing in on the end of day 17, so I'm looking pretty good so far. Here's hoping for 70% or better.

UGCM

 

[TonysChickens]

Final count is 32 out of 34 hatched, 2 died in the shell without pipping. 1 also died a day after the hatch. It seems it was stuck to the shell for a while and the belly never closed up over the yolk completely.

On another note, one of my 4 week olds died too

 

[wishful suburbanite]

=D My hatch isn't doing too bad at all!

3 hatched yesterday evening. One hatched sometime before I got up this morning. One hatched just as I looked at it this morning.

4 more hatched while I've been at work today, my Dad tells me.

I think I've got some curled toes to correct for at least a couple of them, but from what I've heard, there's a good chance I can fix them up with tape no problem.

I 'm sure the heat in my incubator is a bit irregular as the ones closer to the light clearly have been hatching first.

Dad is poking wet, drippy sponges into a couple of the extra air holes (I've got plenty) so they can have a drink and I'll move whoever is out of the shell into the brooder this evening. They look hungry. lol

 

[underground chickenman]

Wrapped up the hatch with 59% on the total batch of eggs, but I removed 21 infertile ones prior to lock down. I hatched 84% of the remaining fertile eggs. Not bad, not great. I've had better and I've had worse. One died in the bator and one died after an hour in the brooder. The rest seem to be doing pretty well. The American's I hatched six weeks ago started laying yesterday, right on the 6-week mark. I have 46 A&M's that are three weeks old yesterday and these 39 Americans. I think I am done hatching for a while. I am going to let all of the above grow out, then separate my breeders, layers and freezer campers. Then I will breed my own for a little while until I feel like I need to inject some new genes.

Good luck to all those still hatching.

UGCM

 

[SavageChick]

Congratulations on the hatches everyone. My little button quail operation here is pretty small potatoes, so it's a bit intimidating to even post this next to those of you with larger hatches. I started out with only 16 shipped button quail eggs, but five were either cracked or infertile. Set 11, with four that had both separated air sacs and/or larger than normal air sacs (wrote about this on another thread). Covered one hairline crack on a pretty blue egg with nail polish and it hatched just fine, so there is testimony that the nail polish trick does indeed work. The eggs with deformed air sacs hatched fine, but I did notice that they zipped lower than usual. Ended up with 8 making it to complete hatch. One chick was weak yesterday (walking backwards and star-gazing), but seems to have overcome whatever was going on after some nursing with vitamins/minerals. All different color varieties, so I'm pretty excited to have our first wild-type and one that is a pretty silver-back. Like you, UGCM, I think we may take a break from hatching for a while, but raising buttons has definitely been a fun and terrific learning experience for our entire family.

 

[natedog44]

Do courtix quail lay all year round??

 

[underground chickenman]

They will for a couple of years if you keep them well-nourished and under artificial light during the shorter days. They need at least 14 hours of light to lay steadily. Since most places on earth do not have days that long year round, you have to supplement with artificial light. I live in the south, so I don't have to worry too much about cold, but I would imagine that even with enough light, they might not lay in ridiculously cold temps, but I don't know for sure.

UGCM

 

[swords75xlh]

ok started lockdown sunday night they was rocking sunday night no movement sence then ( but i do see chips in the outer shell )