My First Eggs - Candling Thread - How do they look? UPDATED

[Shayna]

I candled all of my Silkie eggs received by mail yesterday before putting them in the incubator today, and I am posting quite a few of the pictures to see what everyone thinks. I think they look pretty good, although several have shadows in the egg, which move if I turn the egg. There are also a few that clearly have detached air cells, and several are quite porous. All in all, I think if incubation goes well I have a good chance to get quite a few to hatch. This is my first attempt at hatching eggs. I'll be really happy if I can get 6-12 of the 24 eggs to hatch. What do you think? Sorry so many pictures (18), but I wanted to include as many as possible for detail. Two looked like they had possible internal cracks when I candled, so I did put a little pure soy wax on them.

There is an egg that I think is for a white silkie, and its brown like the others, but so dark I can't candle into it at all. The color seems uneven, light would shine through a little, but barely. I couldn't get any pictures. Is that normal for some silkie eggs?

The pictures for the others are here:
http://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd388/shaynablizard/Hatching Silkies/

 

[clatsopduck]

I don't have any experience with silkies, but I do have experience with hatching eggs.
My most recent experience with shipped eggs is that they don't seem to do as well as the home-grown ones so I expect your anticipated numbers is reasonable.

I find dark eggs difficult to candle, but the candler I have isn't very strong either. (I did better with a homemade one years ago...)
I'll be looking forward to your (likely) next installment of pictures when they start looking awesome.

 

[Bantam Username]

Its hard to tell so early, candle again at 4 days and you should see a network of veins spiderwebbing out from a central point in the fertile eggs.

 

[Shayna]

Quote:
Ok it is now the beginning of Day 7 and I recandled all of the eggs. Most were clear or didn't show much shadowing in the egg, very much like they were the day I put them in the incubator. A couple show bloodrings. And there were a few that are very promising with great veining! I'm scared to toss out any eggs, for fear I might throw out one that will develop. I paid good money for these eggs and these are my only chickens I'll have, so I'm not taking the decision lightly. I do however want to toss out any "bomb threats". Since so many of the clear eggs looked the same, I didn't post a picture of each of the eggs, but about half of them are shown here:
http://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd388/shaynablizard/Hatching Silkies/Candling - Day 7/

I did number the eggs and put descriptions to each picture with my observations.
Please - let me know what you think! And I hope maybe my pictures and info I receive will help other newbies out there too!

 

[discoveregg]

Hi Shayna:

Thanks for posting

. I usually have the same problems with candling as you're showing right now - porous eggs that are difficult to see through, questionable eggs, etc. The last batch I had my DH and I tossed 3 - yes, 3 viable chicks that we both agreed were infertile at 10 days! Looking forward to hearing what our eggsperts have to say about your eggs. I'm going to candle mine today too. I have 14 Norwegian Jaerhon eggs in the incubator and it's day 7. I'll be watching this thread closely!

 

[peepblessed]

Quote:
Ok it is now the beginning of Day 7 and I recandled all of the eggs. Most were clear or didn't show much shadowing in the egg, very much like they were the day I put them in the incubator. A couple show bloodrings. And there were a few that are very promising with great veining! I'm scared to toss out any eggs, for fear I might throw out one that will develop. I paid good money for these eggs and these are my only chickens I'll have, so I'm not taking the decision lightly. I do however want to toss out any "bomb threats". Since so many of the clear eggs looked the same, I didn't post a picture of each of the eggs, but about half of them are shown here:
http://s1217.photobucket.com/albums/dd388/shaynablizard/Hatching Silkies/Candling - Day 7/

I did number the eggs and put descriptions to each picture with my observations.
Please - let me know what you think! And I hope maybe my pictures and info I receive will help other newbies out there too!

Hi, I just hatched my first batch of shipped silkie eggs two days ago. I got 20 and 18 made it to lock down. The clear one and the blood ring one became obvious but two others that I was unsure of grew and hatched! I got 14 adorable chicks! Blessings on you hatch!

 

[farmgirlforever18]

have you tried candeling from the big end thats what i do and you can tell a little better on whats going on in the egg

 

[Shayna]

Quote:
Yep, I tried candling them from every angle. Especially the ones I was having trouble seeing anything in. The way they are with the pointy end down, was the way I was best able to see in them and get pictures. The larger end is generally the darker end and it's hard for the light to shine through for me.

 

[Shayna]

Quote:
Hey there, hopefully we have some good hatches. Regardless of my success rate, I'll keep this thread updated as a little journal to help determine which are good. Time will tell!