***OKIES in the BYC III ***

[Ksane]

Kyz, get some sleeps lol It always takes 24 hrs after the pip. I'm excited for you! Can't wait to hear from Bardies about hers.

I keep my grains covered w/ water out of convienence I like having lots of ferment juice to soak other things like treat bread (not healthy but they love it and I aswage my conscience by soaking it in ferment juice) or pellets or crumble or whatever, and lots of juice to start my new batch.  However no it does not need to be covered w/ a layer of water.  Bee keeps hers all thick w/o a water cover and has for quite  a while w/o any problems.

One concern is having enough liquid to start the next batch. I have a feeling I'll be doing some tweaking with it. The birds love it sooooo much though! Well worth it.

 

[shelbydog]

Kyz, get some sleeps lol It always takes 24 hrs after the pip. I'm excited for you! Can't wait to hear from Bardies about hers.
One concern is having enough liquid to start the next batch. I have a feeling I'll be doing some tweaking with it. The birds love it sooooo much though! Well worth it.

You should have plenty of liquid for the next batch. What are you using to scoop it out? I'm using a kitchen utensil that is a stiff screen mesh strainer with a handle to scoop mine out.

 

[shelbydog]

So.....got 13 roosters that have been crowing since 4 am. My chicken processing lesson is this Sunday. 10 are freezer bound. I think 6 more mornings of this I will feel zero guilt in making them permanently silent. Instead of cockadoodle do I will hear "eat me, I'll taste great".

 

[NanaKat]

Hmmmm, it was surprisingly much quieter here this morning!
Thank you. I had gotten used to the cackaphony but the difference is striking.
I'm going to do freezer camp on the five younger cockerels later this week....before they realize they can now crow with the big guys gone. The bantams are not nearly as vocal.

Hope everyone is ready for the significant drop in temps coming. Today I'm adding more hay to the outside coops and emptying the plastic jug waterers and replacing with tubs so the jugs don't freeze and crack.

 

[bardies]

So, mixed bag here...

First chick hatched sometime early this morning and promptly got its head into the water well of the brinsea and well.... just to prove that bigger chicks, and not just very small sized chicks like it says in the manual - can indeed give Christmas and steal it back in a heartbeat.

Happy news! More tapping noises from the box incubator, and a third pip in the Brinsea. So now, in the Brinsea - I have one fully pipped that did it at the narrow end. I wasn't sure on the timing of this one, as it was a place that I hadn't really looked at before. I pulled it out and started chipping a line around, hit some blood and put it back in. Bleeding stopped and receded right away, but that one is going to have to stay and hang out for awhile longer. And now there is a new initial pip on another egg. So, there are still 4 left with no action yet, and at least two+ with promise.

 

[Kyzmette]

Quote:
OMG that was hilarious! In a morbidly sad kind of way. I'm not sure whether to laugh or go "awwwwww".

 

[Kyzmette]

Oh Bardies, I'm so sorry to hear about your chickie! How sad! I would be very teary over that.

I woke up this morning and my eggs looked EXACTLY the way they did last night. NOTHING happened after that first pip. And then I had to come to WORK! I think hatching eggs should be a valid reason for calling in.

 

[Kassaundra]

Kyz, get some sleeps lol It always takes 24 hrs after the pip. I'm excited for you! Can't wait to hear from Bardies about hers.
One concern is having enough liquid to start the next batch. I have a feeling I'll be doing some tweaking with it. The birds love it sooooo much though! Well worth it.

You can get good ideas from others, but each set up is different and has to be tweaked to fit the circumstance, set up and personality of each person, I think. The only way to know those things is to jump in w/ what sounds like will work the best for you, keep the things that are working and rework the things that are not until you have a set up that works completely for you.

 

[Kassaundra]

Oh Bardies, I'm so sorry to hear about your chickie! How sad! I would be very teary over that.

I woke up this morning and my eggs looked EXACTLY the way they did last night. NOTHING happened after that first pip. And then I had to come to WORK! I think hatching eggs should be a valid reason for calling in.

What incubator are you using?

I don't want to needlessly scare or alarm you, but I hatch in a brinsea incubator forced air w/ the fan up by the eggs, and no matter how much water I have in the wells I have a shrink wrapped problem at hatch. If I see no progress on an egg that long I always assist b/c W/ MINE that almost always means they are shrink wrapped inside.

 

[Kyzmette]

It's one of those Little Giant styrofoam things. I've been keeping the humidity above 70% since lockdown, and the only time it dropped was as I was setting up for lockdown. Doggoneit, I set those things on Saturday for a reason! They were supposed to start hatching on a day when I was going to be home! If it's not out when I get home, I'll do something.