November Hatch-A-Longs 2017

[Peep_Show]

Well, this will be an interesting hatch. I inadvertently filled too many humidity troughs and am at a steady 75% with no way to reduce it during lockdown.

I think the (local) Welsummers will come through okay, but my worry is the Marans having too much as they have a denser shell and smaller pore size as they're from a 2500' drop in elevation. I guess time will tell. Tomorrow p.m. is Day 21.

 

[Harmony Fowl]

Hi, all, and hi to those who were hatching with me on the October hatch-a-long. Remember those eggs that never showed up? I finally got them today. It’s quite the random bunch. The labeling is not very helpful, as it turns out, lol. I have a Buff Orpington egg, a couple Partridge Rocks, a couple Silkies (yay, groan, but they can be good company for my poor lone bantam chick from last time) and the rest are rather a mystery. A couple are intended to be mysterious, random mixes fr the breeder, but the others are just not labeled according to the legend. I think maybe a couple Black Australorps, a couple Rhode Island Reds and some kind of sex link. Ah, well, I’m not picky. These guys are resting today after I picked them up from the post office this morning. Quite nice of them to send 14, sort of makes up a little for being a month late. I’m hunting for some fresh ones to hatch with them today and tomorrow and I’ll be setting them Sunday morning. I’m currently experimenting with my incubator to learn more thoroughly where its cool spots are and I’m definitely going to do a daily row by row rotation this time around. I’m also forgoing the auto turner and doing that by hand. It’s less convenient, but I just wasn’t happy with a 50% hatch rate on fresh eggs when I used it last time.

Good luck to everyone still waiting on chicks!

 

[Peep_Show]

I managed to drain water out of one of the humidity troughs without opening the incubator during lockdown. I wended a length of extra tubing I had on hand from a Brinsea humidity pump in through the vent hole of the 1588 hatcher and siphoned out the water. Hopefully not too much damage was done to the hatchlings-in-waiting.

 

[ScottandSam]

I managed to drain water out of one of the humidity troughs without opening the incubator during lockdown. I wended a length of extra tubing I had on hand from a Brinsea humidity pump in through the vent hole of the 1588 hatcher and siphoned out the water. Hopefully not too much damage was done to the hatchlings-in-waiting.

I wouldn't think 75 would hurt. I was jumping up that high during hatching and than back to 65 then up to 80% at one point. I thought we hatch out 10 at day 18 but it turn out 9 and the last 3 eggs were malpostioned and 1 quitter. the quitter quit probable back at day 18 and Im sure humidity played no point in that.
day 21 coming for you

Scott

 

[Peep_Show]

Even with draining the troughs, it's still 75-ish. Right now the humidity in the hatcher is even higher as we have some overachiever chicks that are pipping and hatching at Day 20, so spiking up to 79%. 1 black Marans is out of the shell. 3 other Marans and 2 Welsummers have pipped.

 

[Peep_Show]

This morning's head count in the hatcher is 4 Welsummers (looks like 3 girls and 1 boy) and 4 Marans, with 3 more Marans eggs pipped. (3 Marans eggs doing nothing...at present. It still isn't fully Day 21 yet, so there's hope!)

 

[Harmony Fowl]

Since 14 won’t come even close to occupying the incubator, we went on a late season hunt for hatching eggs today. Many calls and a very wet farmers’ market visit later, we made our way back to the orchard where we got our October chicks. They were very excited to see us and provided us with 22 more chicken eggs, including three bantams, and two random duck eggs. I wasn’t planning on ducks yet, but the more, the merrier. The orchard owner was very excited about us hatching some more fowl for him in the spring, which has me kind of excited, too. My original idea with our newly purchased land was many kinds of fowl. I also had a lot of fun talking with folks at the farmers’ market today. It made me feel really good about my chicken knowledge and the place that exists for me in our local food market.

 

[Peep_Show]

One of my best laying hens came from a farmers market egg. She was a fabulous layer of nearly-daily Large to Extra Large army green eggs. She hatched out of a Rhode Island Red egg.
Good luck with the mystery eggs!

 

[HattieScratchy]

We have our first pipping!! This is so exciting!

 

[pertyjewely]

11 Campbell duck eggs under my broody expected Nov 4th