May 2020 Hatch-A-Long

[Aflanders]

Ok, just saw your question on the other thread. Sounds like a difficult situation. In the first place, you don’t want to let other hens add to a broody’s eggs. Next time, mark the eggs when she starts sitting so you can remove any eggs that get added. Maybe you should do that now so you can remove any eggs added at this point. The hen will abandon any unhatched eggs after a few days to care for the chicks, but if you have an incubator you can throw the newer eggs in there and maybe hatch them yourself.

Second, you can run into problems if you have two hens at different stages of broodiness. I had a hen go broody once after another hen had already been sitting for 2 weeks. When the eggs started to hatch, the new broody got upset, thinking that it was too soon for babies to be hatching, and killed them. So my advice would be to separate the broodies & give them their own nests. Good luck!

Thank you! How long should I let them sit on the current eggs before I know if they are viable? I do know for sure I took a picture on April 4th of her sitting on a few.

 

[CindyinSD]

Most people candle on the 7th-10th days. You can candle earlier if you feel you'll be able to tell by then. I do, for incubator eggs. That said, I would wait until at least the seventh day for a broody hen. That's because I don't want to trouble her if I'm not going to take action. I don't discard 3rd day eggs for failure to develop, though they almost always end up being non-starters--so there's really no point checking until the 7th-10th day.

 

[Aflanders]

Ok but I now have no clue when they should hatch because I didnt know she was even broody til the 4th of April and not sure if that's when she started like all the time and with my other hen adding eggs.

Most people candle on the 7th-10th days. You can candle earlier if you feel you'll be able to tell by then. I do, for incubator eggs. That said, I would wait until at least the seventh day for a broody hen. That's because I don't want to trouble her if I'm not going to take action. I don't discard 3rd day eggs for failure to develop, though they almost always end up being non-starters--so there's really no point checking until the 7th-10th day.

 

[CindyinSD]

Hmm... sounds like you've got a bit of a mess to deal with, then. If she started on April 4th, the first eggs should start hatching around the 25th. If she started sooner than that, they should be hatching anytime, if they're alive. Have you hatched eggs before? I mean like in an incubator? Have you candled them?

 

[goat114]

I have Jersey giants, amercuna , whyndotts and mixes hatching May 5-7th super excited

 

[Aflanders]

Hmm... sounds like you've got a bit of a mess to deal with, then. If she started on April 4th, the first eggs should start hatching around the 25th. If she started sooner than that, they should be hatching anytime, if they're alive. Have you hatched eggs before? I mean like in an incubator? Have you candled them?

Nope have not ever been in this position. Normally just buy baby chicks and make sure they are hens which we have been super lucky until last year and we ended up with only 2 hens and 7 roos.

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

So, we are the ones that put eggs in the incubator while waiting for a hen to go broody. We set 12 OE (BCM x Ameraucana) and 6 BCM, but intended to candle at a week and only keep 6 developing OEs (I doubt I’ll be able to tell with them BCM - so tough to candle!). I thought fertility would be poor because the roo had only been in there for a few days when we started collecting eggs, he is clumsy, and he has 14 hens to cover. Today is Day 4, and every OE egg is developing! I find them so beautiful - I forgot how quickly I get attached to incubating eggs! So, DD and I are discussing - she thinks we should stick with the plan and eliminate six OE eggs at one week, so we can keep the total at 12 eggs and still hope a hen will go broody and take care of the chicks. Now I’m torn and want to keep all of the eggs going and figure something out... We had planned to butcher some of these as meat birds, so extras wouldn’t necessarily be bad... Has anyone here eliminated developing eggs? Or placed 18 babies with a hen? We have Marek’s, so we can’t give away or sell the chicks, unfortunately...

 

[Mixed flock enthusiast]

I have Jersey giants, amercuna , whyndotts and mixes hatching May 5-7th super excited

Nice! We have crested cream legbars but purchased Ameraucana chicks last summer. The pullets are 9 months old now and flightier than I prefer, plus they took awhile to start laying. However, I just LOVE their eggs! The first few were light green, then they turned the most beautiful, pure shade of blue. It’s been a few months, and now they are laying gorgeous, perfectly shaped, large blue eggs, about 3-4 per week per pullet. While the birds aren’t my favorite personality wise, they are so gorgeous and their eggs are so much better than our CCLs!

 

[goat114]

my incubator temp is 97F I've had luck getting hens at 97-98F
yes I currently have one hen and two roosters so I'm hoping for hens out of this batch of eggs

 

[CindyinSD]

Nope have not ever been in this position. Normally just buy baby chicks and make sure they are hens which we have been super lucky until last year and we ended up with only 2 hens and 7 roos.

Well, maybe you have someone to help you. It's hard to know what you're looking at if you've never candled before, so it might help to post pics of eggs being candled. If the images are clear enough, people can look and maybe give you some idea what you're looking at.