New to Hatching Eggs

[Jessicamtorres93]

hi all,

In spring I am thinking about buying and hatching fertile eggs due to losing some chickens in the previous year. This will be my first time hatching eggs. I currently have 3 laying hens. I haven't decided if I should hatch them with an incubator or with one of my hens. what do you think? Also, if I were to have one of my hens hatch them, how could I help get may hen broody? If I use incubation, witch incubator should I use? And with has a higher or lower survival chance? thanks you!

From what I know, some hen types are more broody than others. I used a incubator I got from amazon which was this one
https://www.amazon.com/Magicfly-Dig...op?ie=UTF8&psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_title
Works great and hatched three of my ducks. There is no humidity reader, but it tells you the temp (in Celsius). Good ventilation too.

Good luck!

-Jessica

 

[Bigtom Turkey]

If you can get a Silke hen that would be best, after that the Brahma hen is second.

 

[Willawong Hill]

I have also had broody wyandottes. I would plan on having at least twice the number of eggs as chicks you want as some won't hatch. Especially if you want another 2-3 hens I would aim for at least 6 chicks as statistically half will be roosters. The problem is you may end up with them all hatching (or none!), if you want a guaranteed number of chicks, I'd just buy day olds but if you have a plan for the extras then hatching can be fun.