Serama Hatch-A-Long!!

[Bama1]

My three early birds from yesterday. The other just started pipping this afternoon. Hoping the other 8 all hatch. I have a dozen or so due to hatch next week.

 

[Skink]

Super cute chicks, @Bama1! Is the rest of your hatch going well? Happy late birthday, by the way!

@RockyRose I'm glad the storm went ok thanks to your hard work! Sorry to hear you've got unwanted sperm retention! I've heard folks make claims of as long as 2 to 3 months retained fertility after rooster loss, though that seems to be unusual. I hope your fathers get sorted quickly. I feel you on selling the chicks! I keep telling myself I have to sell all the cochin bantams after hatch... but some are going to be naked neck millie fleurs. How? How could I possibly sell those before raising them enough to pick out a pullet for keepsies?!

@darkbluespace I really recommend the brinsea mini! Basically any eggs I've had start to develop have continued, and it has been really pain free to operate. The big downside being it fits a nonsensically tiny amount of eggs if you like doing more than a few in a go. I know for certain that once I've got land, I'm jumping straight to a cabinet incubator, and until then I'm probably going to use every broody I get in the meantime. Once my serama are laying eggs of their own, incubating space is going to be a problem for sure. If you wanna hatch lots always and use it as a primary, maybe consider splurging on 2 if you don't go right for a hex heh


Just spotted the first external pip out of the 6 eggs! I'm a little worried that I spotted just the 1 pip so early. That's gonna drag this whole process out.. especially since I'm sick and stuck in bed. I moved the 'bator to peer at it while I lay here and that's when I saw it. I hope watched eggs hatch chicks easier than watched pots boil water... I'd better find some movies to distract myself with!

 

[Bama1]

8/11 hatched from this round. I put 12 in lockdown today and looks like only 3 will go into lockdown next week.
I THINK out of these 8 I have 3 roosters and 5 hens. Method used? All of them !

Super cute chicks, @Bama1! Is the rest of your hatch going well? Happy late birthday, by the way!

 

[darkbluespace]

Hey all! I've been quite busy so forgive my lack of updates and photos of chicks...13 hatched on my first batch and 10 silkie/frizzle went into lockdown last night. We had an ice storm and then a major snowstorm here in north Georgia which threw everything off kilter, lots of extra work taking care of outside chickens, pens, runs, and everything else. Twelve of the thirteen chicks are doing very well...but one little grey silkie has splay leg and I'm working on her, she's thriving but don't know if I can save her. Hobble isn't working well. Same thing happened with a hatch back in December, a grey silkie also...I suspect a genetic abnormality at work here. The polish eggs that hatched (2 of 3 set) are doing very well and will likely be like their mom, a bantam gold laced frizzle polish! I think 16 went into lockdown, 3 didn't make it to hatch.

I had thought the frizzled GL polish roo was gone long enough before I collected eggs for hatching - I didn't want any frazzled chicks...but some of the silkie eggs hatched out what appears to be frizzled chicks! Those roos leave there "stuff" with hens much longer than I expected (I waited a month). Some of the hatchlings appear to be from my frizzled cochin and the GL roo - miraculously wonderful little chicks! Still feeling blessed there were no frazzles.

Five out of six of my hens in the silkie pen are trying to go broody...one is definitely there, the others are waffling. Two are very young hens that only just started laying about 2 months ago (if that). It's a riot watching these girls trying to make up their minds about setting - swapping nests, generally grumpy, two hens on one nest sometimes...quite the chuckle. I really don't know if any of the eggs in the coop are viable with the freezing temps we had, and I was not doing a good job of collecting eggs from their coop. Waiting to see who really does sit, then I can candle eggs after a few days to see if any are really viable.

Between the incubator and the broodies I'm going to have to sell some chicks and this will be an extremely difficult decision for me...who will I keep?

It's been many years since I have tried uploading pics to this site and couldn't do it then, but I will try to do it later today. It appears that upgrades to the site may make this much easier now. The batch that hatched earlier this week are changing SO fast, some of them are getting frizzled already, so I may take new pics to upload today. If I have the time to figure out how to do a collage type pic I'll do a day old pic with a new pic...we shall see! I have the software but haven't really figured it out

. Still "laying low" after the backbreaking snow removal from Wednesday - so it's a good project for today.

Hope everyone's Seramas are doing well. Still waiting for weather to improve to get the Serama breeding pair shipped to me...maybe this week as we are expecting a warm up to nearly 60F! Hooray! Of course rain is expected with the warm up, so more GA mud to deal with, but that's a sure sign of Spring coming.

Here's at least one pic (many pics are still on my phone, not the PC), this is one of my favorites of the silkies...at about 24 hrs old.

Super adorable! Silkies make the cutest chicks!

 

[darkbluespace]

8/11 hatched from this round. I put 12 in lockdown today and looks like only 3 will go into lockdown next week.
I THINK out of these 8 I have 3 roosters and 5 hens. Method used? All of them !

So adorable, congratulations!!

 

[RockyRose]

@Bama1 Congrats on your babies! I see, like me, you are still incubating lol. Thansk for the pictures. Fun times!

@darkbluespace - Thank you, that is definitely one of the "prettiest" silkies. I've really got to find a way to get some good pics, especially since I have batch 2 hatched now (8 out of 10 that went into lockdown hatched on Mar 1-2nd). Sadly I got another spraddle leg on this 2nd batch, worse than the 1st one, so doing chick medical care on top of regular care.
.
Third and last lockdown now in process with shipped silkie and sizzle eggs (from SQ lines). Day 21 is Thursday and I'm worried about these. At least 75% have saddle shaped air cells, so I've been researching how to deal with this issue. 23 eggs set in this last batch.

@Skink Oh my I don't know if I could part with any naked necks of any breed...never had one. One of the shipped eggs in lockdown now is from NN pen so maybe I will have one NN frizzle sizzle. And yeah, parting with any of these babies is making me nuts. Want to keep some that had my black silkie roo as dad since I sold him, want to keep some of the gold laced, want to grow out some frizzles as they sell really well around here (especially once grown out in their full frizzled beauty) and want to keep the two polish babies. Not sure that leaves much to sell. LOL - if the eggs in lockdown have a good hatch rate maybe it won't be so hard to sell chicks as I will have an overabundance...and they eat like crazy!

I think I am going to have to search for some Seramas that I can drive to pick up. Was on a Serama FB page where folks were talking about shipped eggs. The horrible Atlanta USPS hub was discussed, people losing birds, not just eggs, because of the handling there. I am not sure the birds I have on hold will survive shipping to me as they likely would come through ATL (from Washington state). Even the Serama eggs I ordered from KY went through ATL and then traveled back north again to me in north GA (none of these eggs developed). This may be a blessing in disguise to wait to get some Seramas....I have to deal with housing and selling all the chicks I've hatched plus whatever hatches this week so I am going to be a busy chicken momma!

To top things off my well pump died late yesterday...getting replaced this morning...but did not need that added stress. Thankfully I had put up extra water because of last week's storms and hadn't dumped it yet. Will need it this AM for the birds that are outside. Have plenty of fresh bottled water for chicks. Also very thankful my son has been working for a plumber for several months and he knew to shut the water heater off before the heating element blew due to lack of water in the tank - or I might have needed to replace a coil. His boss is coming over this morning to help him replace both the well pump and bladder tank (which was already shot)...so should have water back before noon. And better than before!

Pics are coming, got to get them off my phone and onto the PC. With this last batch hatching soon I'll probably wait until they are done to post pics. So much to do and so little time!

 

[darkbluespace]

@RockyRose Wow, you are super busy! Glad the water is being taken care of quickly and nice that you were accidentally prepared for it ; ) I am glad I am not the only one who can't decide who to sell! I am pretty much selling all my hatchlings, though I would like to hatch more Seramas for myself, but I have some older birds I just can't figure out what to do with.... like 6 or more little roos and when I think about giving them away I feel so attached. They are getting older though and a bit more obnoxious!

I have some ducks, quail and Seramas all about to hatch... not the best planning. I imagine I was thinking the quail would hatch a week before the Seramas but really it is only a couple days. I put the quail in my old little hatcher because there is a stinker in there but hard to figure out which one. I had to get another thermostat so I could get another hatcher up and running, fortunately I had it all ready to go, just needed the thermostat and a power cord for the fan. I bought some quail chicks a couple weeks ago because someone gave me a great deal.. 16 for $20 and a lot of them are Texas A&M which I had wanted. I decided to raise my own because I just can't buy any decent eggs around here. They are either infertile or old and barely fertile, so annoying!

Just waiting for pips now!!

 

[Skink]

I think my hatch is done.. only 4 babies. I think the remaining 2 are late deaths. Haven't water candled, but I don't see internal pips or hear anything on regular candling and they just don't look right. If so these deaths happened after day 18 candle. I attribute it to either hen health (all my clears had paper thin eggs) or homozygous short leg gene. We'll see at break out. I'll water candle them later, and I hope they prove me wrong, but I've got a bad feeling. Honestly after all is said and done, I'm a little unhappy with these eggs. I was sent some really filthy ones, one of which is one of the probable late death, and eggs that thin don't speak of good layer health. The first dozen went MIA during shipping, so this is the second box he sent.. I wonder if he just thumbed the quality control in frustration? :\

The 4 babies that are out are happy and healthy as can be! I had to yet again assist one entirely out. She pipped the wrong end! That hatch took 32 hours of slow going. It took her a long time to absorb, since her external was also her internal. By the time she was done she just could not get out, even when I made a full artificial zip for her, so I had a chick born in to my hands again. All 4 of them are still in the incubator drying up and GOLLY are they ever cute! Please, all of you be hens. Please. They have those super cute dark eye markings that make them look like they've got bambi eyes with hollywood lashes!

Speaking of, I picked which of my 4 cockerels from the first batch of 5 babies (sigh) are staying and which are going. Horus is staying! The others are for sale. So far I've only had lots people ask me for hens I'm not selling, and two people asking for them in areas where roosters are explicitly banned regardless of noise ordinance

 

[darkbluespace]

I think my hatch is done.. only 4 babies. I think the remaining 2 are late deaths. Haven't water candled, but I don't see internal pips or hear anything on regular candling and they just don't look right. If so these deaths happened after day 18 candle. I attribute it to either hen health (all my clears had paper thin eggs) or homozygous short leg gene. We'll see at break out. I'll water candle them later, and I hope they prove me wrong, but I've got a bad feeling. Honestly after all is said and done, I'm a little unhappy with these eggs. I was sent some really filthy ones, one of which is one of the probable late death, and eggs that thin don't speak of good layer health. The first dozen went MIA during shipping, so this is the second box he sent.. I wonder if he just thumbed the quality control in frustration? :\

The 4 babies that are out are happy and healthy as can be! I had to yet again assist one entirely out. She pipped the wrong end! That hatch took 32 hours of slow going. It took her a long time to absorb, since her external was also her internal. By the time she was done she just could not get out, even when I made a full artificial zip for her, so I had a chick born in to my hands again. All 4 of them are still in the incubator drying up and GOLLY are they ever cute! Please, all of you be hens. Please. They have those super cute dark eye markings that make them look like they've got bambi eyes with hollywood lashes!

Speaking of, I picked which of my 4 cockerels from the first batch of 5 babies (sigh) are staying and which are going. Horus is staying! The others are for sale. So far I've only had lots people ask me for hens I'm not selling, and two people asking for them in areas where roosters are explicitly banned regardless of noise ordinance

I am glad you got 4 cute babies!! Congratulations!! Hoping for hens for you! I just realized that the last of 3 chicks I was keeping for myself is also a roo! I do want to see how the roos come out but I really have to do something about the excess # so I am not super thrilled to have 3 more.

I hear you about the low quality eggs. I wonder about breeders with eggs of that quality. I think because of the size of Seramas, they are easy to keep in small cages to breed, but it is a sad chicken life. I am opting to go the way of a few separate coops so that birds have access to outdoors and vegetation and if I have a few in cages ( because I haven't figured out what to do with them yet ) then I make sure they get some vegetation which I find does wonders for egg/shell quality. Though I do have one young hen that is completely free range and her egg quality is not great. I wonder if that is just a quality of her's, not really related to nutrition, that I should try not to breed into my flock. Maybe it will improve as she gets older.

 

[Bama1]

I bought a trio last month. I do have them in the house in the cage, BUT they get play time out of it every day and they get the same stuff I feed my big birds, egg shells, layer pellets, herbs (mint, parsley, cilantro) and kale. I buy it just for the chickens cause I can't cook LOL LOL. I ship a lot of eggs from my large fowl and have amazing reviews from them. The trio I just bought is older, the hens are two to three years old, but they started laying only 5 days after getting here (in my living room) and I am getting 6-7 eggs a week from the them together. Not bad! And the shells are wonderful.
In other news..... Round two started today, I have three out this afternoon. Hoping the other eight pop out tonight!