- May 18, 2008
- 5
- 0
- 7
Are her eggs goners now?
She sat on them for 14 days and then DH mowed the lawn and she was beside herself. She left the nest and it was at least a day (24 hours) or a day and a half (36 hours) before she started sitting on them again. I turned the nest box in a different direction (from the mowed lawn, which she previously faced) and she seems to have accepted it as safe now.
It's been a month since my hennies were with a rooster, and I'm worried that the new eggs aren't even fertile anymore. The batch she was sitting on surely was.
Should I let her sit on the same eggs she abandoned and then went back to, or do I need to replace them with new eggs if I want chicks?
This is the first time we've done this, and the kids and I were so excited. But now I hear some of you hatch eggs from grocery stores, so they get significantly chilled, right? Though not in the middle of the incubation period.
Do those old eggs have any hope left in them, or should I just start her over with a new batch of (hopefully, fingers-crossed, still-fertile) eggs? If there is any hope, I want to leave them there, but I don't want to end up with exploding rotten eggs if I can avoid it.
FWIW, seven of my hens are Golden Comets, I have one Comet/Araucana mix, a Silver Wyandotte, and a "something else."
- Amanda in VT, where nighttime temps are getting down to the 40s still...
She sat on them for 14 days and then DH mowed the lawn and she was beside herself. She left the nest and it was at least a day (24 hours) or a day and a half (36 hours) before she started sitting on them again. I turned the nest box in a different direction (from the mowed lawn, which she previously faced) and she seems to have accepted it as safe now.
It's been a month since my hennies were with a rooster, and I'm worried that the new eggs aren't even fertile anymore. The batch she was sitting on surely was.
Should I let her sit on the same eggs she abandoned and then went back to, or do I need to replace them with new eggs if I want chicks?
This is the first time we've done this, and the kids and I were so excited. But now I hear some of you hatch eggs from grocery stores, so they get significantly chilled, right? Though not in the middle of the incubation period.
Do those old eggs have any hope left in them, or should I just start her over with a new batch of (hopefully, fingers-crossed, still-fertile) eggs? If there is any hope, I want to leave them there, but I don't want to end up with exploding rotten eggs if I can avoid it.
FWIW, seven of my hens are Golden Comets, I have one Comet/Araucana mix, a Silver Wyandotte, and a "something else."
- Amanda in VT, where nighttime temps are getting down to the 40s still...
