My Araucana Hatch! * 4 HATCHED - Chick PICS!! *

[KristaChickenWhisperer]

I am a first time hatcher and really nervous about candling for some reason!! What did you use to candle?

Any other advice for a first time hatcher would be GREAT!

 

[katrinag]

OMG, that pic is just awesome.
We need you to take pic of each day of development and have the mods sticky it.

 

[MichiganWoods]

AngieChick, that is an awesome bator!

I will have to get pictures of mine at some point. I had taken a few before I made some modifications, but it's basically a copy of speckledhen's fridge-a-bator .

Jody, thank you! Most of them wouldn't photograph well, but that one was so visible when I candled that I just had to try and get a decent image of it.

Thank you Solsken Farm!

For those curious about what I am using to candle...

I have a high powered LED flashlight called an Element K2. I purchased mine in a twin pack at Sam's club for around $25, I think. It's been a while. Anyway, I cut out a soft foam ring and attached it to the rim of the flash light so that the eggs could be cushioned and the light would not leak out around the bottom of the egg. Then I set my camera up on a tripod and flip it to the manual setting. I have it take a 15 second exposure with a 2 second delay, so I can get my hands off of the camera before it starts to take the picture. Then I play around with the exposure, brightness and contrast in Photoshop to enhance what we can see.

That being said... I will be getting a new camera here very shortly that will allow me to take even better images. If you thought these were good, get ready.

Next time I hatch I should be able to take some incredible photographs. -- Then I will work on a progress shoot for development, katrinag.

KristaChickenWhisperer, as far as other advice... just read through the Learning Center here on BYC and also read through some older posts about hatching people have written. There's a mountain of gold here, you just have to dig to find the nuggets you need.

 

[AK Michelle]

After seeing your pic yesterday I couldn't wait any longer so while turning my eggs I held a flashlight to them, it's a tiny pocket light that fits in the cig lighter in my car to re-charge, got it as a stocking stuffer, anyway, by holding it to the tip of the egg it illuminated the insides enough to see the veins in my 5 lightest eggs. I got them from a friends, they are mutts but 2 are green (easy to see) 3 are light brown, and the rest of the dozen are medium to dark brown.

This will be my first hatch, thanks MichiganWoods for the great candling pics on your page!!!

Happy Hatching
Michelle

 

[twzlrwho]

What a great picture! I am starting to see a small spider in my eggs as well...yay! Good luck to you!!!!!

 

[KristaChickenWhisperer]

Thanks!! I will have to get busy and do that. So far I feel pretty confident with all the other stuff I have learned. I have millions of chicken books (or so it seems) and have pretty much read each ones chapter on incubating and hatching eggs. Although I have raised chickens for several years I've never quite done something like this.

I am very excited though!!

 

[MichiganWoods]

Day 12 Update:

There's not much to photograph now. The embryos, their veining/yolk sac and the air sacs are taking up most of the space inside the eggs. I can see definite movement in 5 of the eggs, but the one that's very dark and thicker shelled I can't see movement. However, when I candle from the bottom I can make out some faint veining.

I decided to crack open the one egg from this batch that I was fairly sure wasn't developing, and it wasn't.

Recap:

5 eggs have visible bouncing embryos.
1 egg is too dark to see movement, but when candled from the bottom, shows veining, so I believe it to be viable and growing.
1 egg looked undeveloped so I cracked it open and verified my suspicions.

 

[MichiganWoods]

Day 18 Update:

I can't see a darned thing when candling them now, except the dark baby-mass occasionally shifting about. Tonight they come off the turner and we begin the 3 day countdown!


Jody... I'm curious what the initials on the eggs mean. Different breeding pens? I've got 4 MAs, 1 W1 and 1 W3.

 

[kyeschicks]

wow! 3 more days!

 

[hinkjc]

Getting close Cass...how eggciting! The 1 & 3 pens are pure whites. The MA is a mixed pen with blue, black, splash, duckwing, and bbr type birds.