Setting eggs 3/15/14 - Who is with me?

[Farmer Viola]

is an egg that looks like this still viable?
the incubator i guess was on 104 for the past 2 days

oh no! 104 is pretty hot!

are the red lines veins? if there is veining, I would leave it in

 

[Farmer Viola]

My incubator hasn't been able to get to the right temp so i have had to adjust it and constantly for the past 2 day (day 5-6 of incubation) my temp has been fluctuating from 99-102 degrees. Im trying to get it to hold at 101 but it may end up holding at 102. My question is 1) Did these minimal temp fluctuations kill the birds, 2) is it ok if i do end up holding the bator at 102?

I do not think very small variations like 99-102 will hurt them at all! no need to worry

In fact I have practiced "daily cooling" in the past where I take the lid off the incubator for 10-30 minutes each day, just as a mother hen would get off the nest every day. the eggs would get down to around 85F (I shoot them with a laser thermometer) at the end of the cooling time and have had good hatch rates while doing this. not necessarily because of it, but it didn't hurt anything!

The brinsea 'advanced' incubators include a cooling feature that lasts a lot longer, 2-3 hours I think...

 

[CoopDeDoo]

Quote:
Welcome and 12 of 14 is an awesome number!

 

[CoopDeDoo]

Quote:
x2

 

[Tuhmu]

Quote: That's a bit of a relief as I thought I may have killed it, as soon as I saw it when I cracked it open I stopped and re-candled everything! Not sure if I just have a bad candler or if its just hard to see but there were a few that were very difficult to see anything other than the tips of the blood veins touching the air sac.

 

[OR4-hmom]

hi everyone! I was in the March hatch a long but realized mine are actually due April 3! Then I found your thread and I set just 1 day off from you, on 3/14 hopefully I can join in late?! I read all your posts too.

here is what I have done so far!
I set 14 shipped Wyandotte eggs on 3/14, I saw confirmed detached air cells in around half of them so I treated them all as detached...
candled on day 7 and saw good veining in all but 3, marked those to check again day 10.

day 10 candle -
of those 3 questionable eggs: 1 clear, 1 early quitter, 1 viable!

the viable egg is a weird one. the air cell is on the side, not the tip. I wonder if it will affect the positioning of the chick at hatch time? We will see!!
day 10 (yesterday) final count: 12 of 14 viable
I am PRETTY ecstatic about this number!!! my hopes were way way down when I saw the detached air cells (this ALWAYS happens with shipped eggs!) so starting today...I am actually feeling excited and hopeful. c'mon chickies!
10 more days. how will I ever last until then.. it seems an eternity away!!!!

Hi Farmer Viola!
I recognize you from BLRW thread, is that what you're hatching? I love it when the questionable eggs surprise me with little dancers later. I can't offer much help with the wonky air cell, only know I hate saddle bag air cells.

 

[Farmer Viola]

That's a bit of a relief as I thought I may have killed it, as soon as I saw it when I cracked it open I stopped and re-candled everything! Not sure if I just have a bad candler or if its just hard to see but there were a few that were very difficult to see anything other than the tips of the blood veins touching the air sac.

when I first looked at the photo, I thought hmm maybe it was alive until that point..
you being the cracker-opener would have to look right when it opens, if the veins are in tact spider webbing out, it's probably alive. If the veins are already severed with loose blood in the shell, it is probably already dead. I will look for these "pools" of blood when I candle early quitters. looks like little clumps of blood instead of veining.
your embryo looked like it had zero blood in its body, it had blood loss in shell I think....?
that and, development was 4ish days behind I think it quit early..

Hi Farmer Viola!
I recognize you from BLRW thread, is that what you're hatching? I love it when the questionable eggs surprise me with little dancers later. I can't offer much help with the wonky air cell, only know I hate saddle bag air cells.

YES it IS!!! I have blue laced red Wyandotte eggs from Chickenhill in the bator right now

And I'm in Oregon too! around Forest Grove. what type of eggs are you incubating?
I hate those saddle air cells too, seems to always happen with detached. this one is so weird though.. I should pencil it and take a picture, maybe it has happened to someone else before.. the air cell is perfectly round, it's just off to the side instead of the top. I incubated them right side up!

 

[Tuhmu]

when I first looked at the photo, I thought hmm maybe it was alive until that point..
you being the cracker-opener would have to look right when it opens, if the veins are in tact spider webbing out, it's probably alive. If the veins are already severed with loose blood in the shell, it is probably already dead. I will look for these "pools" of blood when I candle early quitters. looks like little clumps of blood instead of veining.
your embryo looked like it had zero blood in its body, it had blood loss in shell I think....?
that and, development was 4ish days behind I think it quit early..

There was some blood in the other shell, there were no blood veins though. I pulled this particular one because it looked like a blood ring.

 

[Farmer Viola]

Yeah, I think you made the right call, sounds like it was for sure gone already

 

[Tuhmu]

So I've been doing some quick minor research while at work on "blood rings" and it appears that there are many causes but one worries me, and that is the humidity. I had mine set at 45% RH and in one of the topics I read it said to have it lower for the first 10-14 days, like in the 35% range. Could that have been part of the cause that so many had blood rings? I think I had five.

If that is the case I'm pretty stumped, because even with my humidity at 45% my remaining eggs have lost an average of 8% of their weight on day 10. I thought that that would be a hair to much for day 10 so I increased the humidity last night to 50%. If anyone could advise me so I can get back on the right track, starting to get pretty concerned, there's just so much conflicting information out there.