Putting refrigerated eggs under a broody.

[bobbi-j]

Well, I am not sure if I'll be able to complete this experiment or not. One of the refrigerated eggs disappeared sometime between locking them in last night and after work today. (A GREEN one, darn it! I only had three to start, and then one was a clear when I candled) So now I'm down to 3 refrigerated eggs, 5 not. If the eggs continue to disappear, the farm supply store should still have babies next week...

 

[bobbi-j]

Update: Five out of the seven remaining eggs hatched yesterday, the other two have shown no progress. Of the two remaining eggs, one was a refrigerated one (my only green one left ) and one was not. Will do eggtopsies once mama has left the nest with the others.

 

[lilwildrabbit]

Old Faithful has gone broody for the first time this spring. She's my only green egg layer and has been exposed to my EE cross rooster. Over the weekend I had contemplated ordering chicks from the feed store to slip under her sometime around her hatch date, but found out today that I need to order a minimum of 15. I really don't want to order that many, as I don't wish to brood any this year, and she would not be able to cover them all. As I was thinking about this, I had also thought about saving her last 3 eggs she laid last week to put under her. They were still on the counter, so I figured I'd just leave them there until I made up my mind. Unfortunately, my DH can't read my mind (that might be a good thing sometimes) and was being helpful on Sunday and put them in the fridge. I have read that refrigerated eggs can hatch, so I am putting those 3 eggs and the 7 largest brown eggs under her to see what happens. We'll have 1/2 refrigerated eggs, and 1/2 counter eggs. If nothing hatches, I'll go to the feed store and get a few out of the bin for her.

I lost over half my flock in January this year to dogs I didn't have enough money to go buy chicks but found an incubator for about 60 bucks online and bought it I used refrigerated eggs that I had along with eggs that I had gathered the day before and waited till the incubator can well I had more hatch from the tefridgerated eggs than the eggs I had set aside and the refridgerated eggs were over a month old!

 

[bobbi-j]

A month old??? Good to know for future reference!

 

[lilwildrabbit]

I was suprised that they would even hatch being my first incubation and mess d that up a bit too but none the less I have them now with my flock and growing !

 

[bobbi-j]

[

I was suprised that they would even hatch being my first incubation and mess d that up a bit too but none the less I have them now with my flock and growing !

Glad it worked out for you! Incubation (and raising chickens in general) can have a pretty steep learning curve.

 

[wynn4578]

I have not tried it but I've heard of people buying eggs from Trader Joe's and hatching them. Old wives tale? I don't know but what I do know is eggs are a ton more resilient than they are given credit for. My guess is as long as the eggs are still fairly fresh ( less than a week) you would probably get a decent hatch rate. The key would be (a) good humidity in the fridge to prevent moisture transfer (b) a clean fridge so as not to introduce bacteria (c) not so cold that it would damage the egg I don't have a number for that but I'm sure there has been research done in that matter.

 

[chicknic]

My hen just hatched two Easter Eggers that came from my cousin's refrigerator! I really wanted some blue eggs and the only ones she had had been refrigerated. It can work! It was a fun experiment for the whole family. We are naming one May after the Maytag she came out of.

 

[bobbi-j]

My hen just hatched two Easter Eggers that came from my cousin's refrigerator! I really wanted some blue eggs and the only ones she had had been refrigerated. It can work! It was a fun experiment for the whole family. We are naming one May after the Maytag she came out of.

I'm jealous of your EEs! That's part of the reason I set some refrigerated eggs. The broody is my only EE, and the only eggs I had from her (three of them) had been refrigerated. So I thought, "Heck, why not give it a try?" Unfortunately, the one remaining EE egg did not hatch. Oh well, I'm sure she'll go broody later this summer. She usually tries at least twice a summer.

 

[bobbi-j]

Well, 24 hours after hatching, and Mama has her 5 babies out of the coop, exploring the run. I didn't have any feed for them yesterday (we're farmers and it's kind of crazy around here right now), but did put the baby waterer out for them yesterday evening. It rained last night, so DH went to town and got some non-medicated grower for them. (That way if the hens eat it, no biggie. I won't put out any more layer feed now until whatever pullets I acquire this summer start laying) I put some feed in the baby feeder for them today, and Mama showed them exactly what to do! I love watching a broody with little ones running around.