Need advice.

[Ravynscroft]

Yes, I did post on that thread. They are araucana eggs and now you know why I was spazzing. The already low hatch rate on shipped araucana eggs and then the post office. lol Also got some from out of Florida along with some cream legbars. Since ordering I've learned that I can expect 0 to hatch. At least that us what everyone tells me. But that's OK because you live you learn. Even so I would like to give them the best possible chance. I must say she has her packaging skills down to an art form.

Did you buy eggs or birds? How did they do?

Did your Araucana eggs come out of NJ?

I bought eggs originally... I think 3 or 4 batches total from same source, but I had a series of unfortunate events in shipping the first couple batches, lol... last one I had a great hatch, lots of chicks... not SOP, but they were great birds, good layers...

 

[JuJubeann]

Haha, you actually hatched araucana eggs that had been shipped? Your suppose to be a myth! lol Do you still have some of those araucanas? I really do want to purchase some show quality birds. Or as close to show quality as I can afford. I want to start out small though. Ones set of my eggs are a soft powder blue and the others are a range of blue leaning to the green side.

Don't laugh at this question. But are there any araucanas that are white with red splashes of feathers? I want a bird like that...so pretty to me. It isn't important if it's recognized or not to me.

 

[Ravynscroft]

Ugh, whole post with pics lost!

Red Pyle is what you're referring to, I believe... kinda similar to these??
*not my pics*

Not to SOP, but I think there are a few working on it as a project color...

Yes, I hatched shipped and I do have 1 hen left from my originals, just cuz she's a special fave... the rest have been culled out as I have bred forward and picked out new breeders...

My Storm girl...

I also did hatch out 2 from shipped eggs this summer too, different source... a black cockerel and a GDW pullet, gorgeous birds... will have to get pics of them... their eggs came from the same breeder that our Apollo came from...

Apollo, my foundation sire...


Egg color will vary quite a lot... it's one of the last things that breeders worry about...

 

[JuJubeann]

The first bird looks more like the pic I saw but the red was splashed. The picture I saw wasn't very good and I'm not even sure it was an araucana. The angle and distance wasn't so good either. But it was in the run with a group of araucanas.

Your babies are beautiful. Can't wait to see pics of your others. Well you certainly have done very well hatching araucanas. Did you hatch them in a havobator? I just bought another incubator but haven't used it yet. I may return it and get a havobator based on what you have said about it in other post.

Can I get you to share the details of how you hatched your araucanas? All mine are in the incubator now but I only put them in this past Saturday. The temp is 99.5 with 40% humidity. Changing to 65-70% humidity on day 18.

I already got some help on the araucanas thread to lower my humidity on the first 18 days. The humidity here changed drastically and keeping it at 40 was nearly impossible. It's cool here and I had to turn on the air to dry it out some in the room.

 

[Ravynscroft]

The color you saw could have been from one parent being red based and the other dominant white... it tends to have a splashed red on white look... look up pics of red sex link cockerels, those are good examplse of red/dominant white crossings...

Yes, I use Hovabators for all my smaller batches... I have a Leahy as well, but the Hovas are hands down my faves of the cheaper bators... for the first batches I used a Hovabator 1602N still air and did well with it... when I decided to get another bator, I went with the Hovabator Genesis 1588... loved it more so got a 2nd and ended up sending my original off to a member that needed a good bator... they're still using it with great results and my Genesis' are still going strong after 2 years of almost nonstop use, lol...

For Araucanas, I found a lower humidity works best, 30-35% or so, but always monitor the air cells and use those to guide you... my temls I tend to run a bit higher, closer to 100 and 100.5, but that's a personal choice and I hatch ducks as well and it works across the board for me... hatching between 65-70% is what I shoot for as well...