November Hatch-A-Long (2014)

[darkbluespace]

I thermostat is something I have certainly considered. I kind of got thrown into this incubating thing, though. A month ago I didn't think I would be hatching eggs at all. I gave my friend some eggs after her neighbors dog killed her chickens and a week later she confessed that she didn't really have the time or patience to hatch right now, so the incubator went home with me. For now I'm just testing things out to see what works and forming ideas. We'll certainly be building a much nicer and bigger incubator before spring, though, with all the niceties included.

I hear you... I didn't intend to incubate eggs either. I got eggs for my broody duck but she wouldn't sit on them so I had to throw together an incubator. I was quickly addicted and with each hatch have upgraded... getting a bigger cooler... adding a fan... adding a thermostat... building a hatcher and now I am working (slowly) on a cabinet incubator!

 

[rachelpotter]

We are excited for you as well. Just wondering what whether zone you are in? And if you are in the North, what are your plans for brooding them especially once they feather out.

I'm in Mississippi. Building a coop now that has a built in brooder 8'x3'. It can also be divided. so once the are old enough to leave the house they will move out there and then gradually be integrated into the flock which is 5 weeks old now.

 

[Iko127]

I just sold 2 of my CCL pullets, 1 was 25 weeks and the other 17. They were GFFs A & B lines. What lines do you have? More than likely the A & B lines will not be called Creme Legbars in a few months time and may get a different name. Where are your eggs from? Since you plan on breeding, I would strongly suggest asking the source about the pedigree before you spend time hatching and then finding out they are not going to be "Creme" Legbars anymore. If you just plan to having beautiful birds with blue eggs, then it does not matter.

Hi, I have Greenfire lines and the eggs I bought are straight Greenfire lines also. Thank you for letting me know I would like to do the right thing but also just love the bird and pretty blue eggs! I'm in Florida and its hard to find the girls unless for a lot of money or must buy a pair. I like hatching just a little tuff on shipped eggs but its exciting! Can't wait for the 8th!! Good luck to you

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Let me see what I can do. Lockdown is a very good milestone, but then many people discard eggs after first candling as well. So I consider first candling as a better milestone for measuring hatch rates vs. lockdown. Because 1st candling has already discarded non-fertile eggs, so the remaining eggs should be counted towards fertile but not hatchable (if they don't hatch). What do you think?

Very good point. you do have your quitters before lockdown. That's probably a better more accurate hatch rate.

Just another heads up - you aren't able to edit a post after it's two weeks old, so you may want to put the info in a google document instead and embed it in the first post. Then once you aren't able to edit the post anymore, you can still edit the google document.

That's good to know. That sounds like a lot of extra work.

 

[Sustained]

Hi everyone!

We have 3 broody hens at the moment, 2 belgian Duccles (Anna and Snowflake) and a bantam wyandotte (Spikey) and we decided to get 12 fertile eggs for them all to share! They are all setting 4 eggs each. All bantam Australorps in black, blue and splash. Super excited!

We set them at 9:30 last night and they are due on November 10.

Welcome!! Good luck with your broodies!

I'm not making any promises about how well it will work, I just like it better than the other one for now.

The styrofoam incubator would occasionally shoot up to 103, 104, 105 sometimes for no reason. With no fiddling at all the aquarium will top out at 102 and settle around 98 at night. The top is just some fitted hardware cloth with a towel over it so, I solved that by adding a towel at night time to keep the temp from dropping and removing it at daytime to keep it from going up to 102. If it starts warming up, I just fold back a corner of the last towel for a half hour and it evens out just fine. I'm still having to baby it, but at least I know it won't shoot up to 105, the bulb just doesn't get that hot.

I believe that what killed my first set of eggs on day 19 was the temperature spiking over 104 while I was out for the day. At this point I'll take my chances with too low, as long as I don't have to worry about too hot.

Sounds like my Styrofoam cooler incubator. I had to watch it constantly. I didn't mind because I was so excited and looking into constantly anyways. It had a tendancy to spike constantly for no reason too. I controlled it fairly well from constant babying but later found out that my temp/humidity gauge was off by a lot so I only had 2 hatch. I was so disappointed. I hope you have much better luck with your aquarium setup! I'm going to try it with my spare aquarium just for fun. I went and got it out of my workshop last night and will be picking up the other supplies later today or tomorrow to work on it. I think I will try a barnyard mix in it, or maybe try hatching store bought eggs(saw a post earlier about it and I'm fascinated by the idea) and gift the chicks to my grandparents when they're ready for a coop. Their flock is suffering from a hawk issue.

I couldn't believe it! They are normally about $40 a dozen and my last dozen were shipped and only 2 hatched, so I hope I will have better luck with these. With local eggs I often hatch them all!

Score on the Silkie eggs! Mine were given to me because they didn't have extra Serama eggs to give me and the last couple of Silkie eggs I got from them were clear. Now I am more excited about the Silkies than the Seramas!

Here are my latest two Anconas... the yellow one has faint spots coming in, I hope it's silver or lilac... it looks like a Pekin right now.

I've been seeing a lot of people post about hatching seramas lately. I'd never heard of them before I joined this site. Can I ask what the draw is to them? I can see clearly that they're gorgeous but was wondering if it's the range of feather colors, egg production, egg colors, are they rare....? Just curious why they're so popular. I'm sure I could do the research to find out but since you mentioned them I thought I'd ask

Oh my gosh!! What adorable fuzzies!! My resolve to wait on ducks is wavering heavily LOL

 

[ochochicas]

Gotta love craigslist! I got my silkie eggs from my last hatch free off there. I make sure to check regularly for more egg deals! $8 for a dozen eggs is awesome! And you're saving money in the long run you know

I had to look up Anconas. Pretty, pretty, pretty! I've never had ducks so I'm not familiar with any of the breeds yet. Although one of these days I'm sure I will end up hatching a few ducklings

I got my first batch of eggs on Craigslist - $6 for a dozen. I ended up with 9 chicks. Unfortunately they were not breeds I wanted, so I sold 5 of them to a neighbor for $5 each after they were started. It more than made up for the price of the eggs and the feed to raise them. I probably could have gotten more for them, but I was trying to be neighborly and give her a deal. I also kept 3 pullets that I *hope* will lay the prettiest eggs. One lucky cockerel gets to stay and attempt to be a flock rooster. If that doesn't work out I'll sell him next summer.

 

[ochochicas]

I just sold 2 of my CCL pullets, 1 was 25 weeks and the other 17. They were GFFs A & B lines. What lines do you have? More than likely the A & B lines will not be called Creme Legbars in a few months time and may get a different name. Where are your eggs from? Since you plan on breeding, I would strongly suggest asking the source about the pedigree before you spend time hatching and then finding out they are not going to be "Creme" Legbars anymore. If you just plan to having beautiful birds with blue eggs, then it does not matter.

What is happening with the breed standard? I have no idea where my legbars came from. The did not come directly from Greenfire is all I know. They seem pretty standard for Legbars though with a small crest and laying very light blue eggs that are just under jumbo size.

 

[ochochicas]

Welcome to the Hatch-A-Long. I am excited that your joined so that I can see all your CCL crosses when they hatch. Hopefully you will post pics.

I had 11 eggs to begin with all crosses of my CCL cockerel. Today was my first candling: 1 had been eaten by my broody already. I don't know if got crushed or if she sensed it was not fertile.

Out of the remaining 10- 2 of the 5 Red Star crosses did not develop and 1 had a blood ring. I noticed the ones that did not develop were the freshest eggs. For the past 3 weeks my cockerel is locked in the garage till noon because of neighbors complaints so that makes sense.
1 of the 3 RIR cross did not develp either. Again that was the freshest egg.
The only Australorp egg did not develop either. That also makes sense because she never let him near her.
The only CCL eggs is developing but since its a tiny pullet egg (1.6 oz) I am not so hopeful it will survive.
So bottom line I am down to 6 eggs.

What are your arrangements for brooding them. I am assuming it also gets pretty cold where you are! Or is it not that bad?

The weather here is already bad. I'll be brooding them in the house. We have a small brooder to start them in which will be warmer for them, and when they are 2 weeks old or so they will move into a large pool with the heat lamp on one end. Once they start to fly we will cover the pool with bird netting. It works well and keeps the curious cats out of the brooder. We also have a stock tank we can use, but the pool is bigger. We have an extra bathroom in the house where the bird can say if the "farm smell" starts to get to us. I probably won't be able to leave them out at night until they are 3 months old. We get a LOT of winds and cold temps where we are. I'm hoping to end up with 8 - 12 pullets that we'll keep. Any more than that will be too much during the winter. I would have set more eggs, but if too many of the 35 hatch I'm already in trouble! LOL

How is your CCL egg doing? The story on mine is I just got a small flock from a lady who hatched out her own eggs and didn't want the birds anymore. She said she incubated 20 eggs and only got 4 chicks. I've watched the rooster and he's not the best at his job. I don't know how fertile the eggs are, if at all. The hens were molting when I got them. One is laying shell-less eggs, and some aren't laying at all. I know one is laying for sure every other day. I collected a total of 8 eggs and put them in the incubator. If they hatch, great! If not, I'll try again in the spring.

My other rooster is half CCL. His build and personality are a lot better, in my opinion, than the other rooster. I had planned on hatching a bunch of easter eggers from him. Then my Marans just started laying again after being broody and molting. I saw the roo mate with her one time, so I'm hoping they eggs are fertile, but I have not checked them. I only got 4 since one was broken and she doesn't lay everyday. Same with the australorp...I've seen them breeding but have not checked the eggs.

So that is the story of my eggs. I could not decide which hens to incubate eggs for, so I picked my best layers (Rhodebar and Amberlink) and the easter egger of course. It will be interesting to see if any of the chicks are sex-links.

 

[flemingfeather]

I would like to join in. I will be setting eggs on Friday. Paint silkies and isbars. All are shipped eggs. Will have final numbers on Thursday (depends on if I get extras sent or not. And of course how the post office handles them and packing). I am so excited!!

 

[Antiquity]

I did an early candle today when I got home as I was worried about my second batch not showing any signs of development yet. Fortunately I found dark spots and small veins in 11/12 of them this time. They seem to be a day behind on development, but I am happy with their progress so far. First batch is 7/9, second is 11/12. By this time with the old incubator the first dozen were already dead. Yay for progress!