Setting eggs today...20th May...anyone else?

[ashem0]

My eggs are day 3 today. I set them on Monday lunchtime so counted it as day zero. I will candle day 7 as development is very clear by then and I am in Slovenia for the weekend anyway so won't be tempted to candle until Monday anyway

We are in Italy, but I am English. I am married to an American and we lived in upstate New York for a few years before moving here. We've been in Italy for a little over two years, but have now bought a house here and expect to stay for another 5 years which is the longest we'll have ever stayed in one house!
Where are you in Australia? I've only ever passed through - went to New Zealand twice, but have never stayed in Australia longer than it takes to change planes - hope to one day though...

Some experience with the Marans...particularly the very dark ones, black copper marans. Never hatched a wheaten maran. The dark ones are hard to candle so if you can't see much just sniff them regularly and hope for the best.

Sniff them????

- was my initial reaction to that. But having slept on it, it makes sense. I don't want rotten eggs in there do I! I have read in a few threads that they can explode in the bator - that would be my worst nightmare I think. Does that really happen?

Your day 7 will be my day 5 by the sounds of it, so will be candling around the same time. It sounds funny at this end to hear someone casually say they will "be in Slovenia for the weekend". But that would probably just be like me traveling interstate for the weekend here. I live in New South Wales in the Blue Mountains. Lived in Queensland for a long time but my husband and I moved back home for work and family-raising! Sounds like you have to move around quite a bit... how do you manage the Chooks? Do you give them away and then start up again in the new location?

 

[ashem0]

Ok, I did have to adjust the temps after putting in the glass beads..... Most have been 'child error'. Because everything is now good.

The temps did drop with putting in the eggs, but came back up nicely.

I checked four times last night, and the temp was perfect each time I looked.

Now, I am not positive the egg turner is turning.....but no big deal, I am happy to hand turn, and I am thinking that I simply need something to worry about.

Ashem, I loved the article you linked! Very nice!

But, most of these eggs are so dark, I really do not think I will be able to candle.... Someone said I could weigh them....I might try that.

Were the glass beads cold? Or heated? Made me giggle reading your last thread, because it sounded like me, fussing over my babies... are they warm enough, is the humidity too high, are they turning??? I marked mine with X & O so I can check every now and then to see if they've turned. Sounds like you've got it under control now. I expect when I add my Isa's the temp will drop too.

Is it safe to stack an egg on top of another in the incubator? I might not have room for all 6 of the Isa's.

 

[Alaskan]

I am *guessing* but I think the only problems with stacking would be
1. you would then have to turn by hand (it looks like you have an auto-turner)
2. enough air circulation around each egg for oxygen etc.


I crammed eggs into my incubator, and managed it by taking an egg carton, cutting out the bottoms as much as I could, and putting most of the eggs in the carton. I cut away as much of the carton as I could so that there would still be air circulation.

But..... in standing in the carton, they are definately closer together with less air circulation. I don't know.... we shall see!

 

[loopy12]

I think you can stack them as long as they won't slip if you have autoturner. They will still have less egg-on-egg contact than they would in the nest, but be careful if you have a fan as the top ones will dry out more and slightly reduce air circulation. You also wouldn't want to hatch like that, but you can assume you'll lose some of the eggs by then.

Alaskan: can you rotate the cartons so they take turns on top for better air circulation?

Sniff-test-wise Ashem - sniffing is very effective - they will smell bad well in advance of exploding...
What are the blue mountains like? They sound pretty...
And yes, by the time we leave somewhere I normally have some chicken-loving friends to pass my hens on to. In the past I have hatched to sell as well as for myself. I really enjoy the hatching process. I used to be a scientist and it appeals to that side of me - monitoring gauges, jotting notes, fiddling with parameters to improve the hatch etc.
Our Pekin duck pair in the US were prolific and superfertile and I hatched 71 ducklings out of 72 of her eggs over a period of 4 months - and sold all the ducklings. Ducklings are my favourites, but they are soooo messy. Luckily they are cute enough to be forgiven for the mess

 

[loopy12]

These are the little guys in my brooder right now. Just went to tuck them in for the night. They will be outside full time by the time these new eggs hatch. 4 barnyard chicks (3.5 weeks old), a mallard cross duckling (2.5 weeks old), a Muscovy duckling "cupcake" (10 days old) and a greyback gosling "ozzie" (2 weeks old).

See you after the weekend for candling!

 

[ashem0]

My Isa Browns just arrived, straight from their incubator (only 1/2hrs drive from here), and straight into mine! As you can see I have managed to get them in there at the moment without stacking, but have had to sacrifice the thermometer. I still have the incubator thermometer though it doesn't give a humidity reading. Frustrating! If I stack them I can fit the thermometer back in...ideas? Think I might source a smaller one off the net that I could tape to the side perhaps. I spent ages calibrating these though.

The eggs on the side will have to be manually turned, but that's okay I can do that. And they are in day 5 so it will probably be a good thing that they are on the side cause they'll be ahead of the Marans eggs by ~3 days, so the Marans will keep turning.

Got a bit of juggling to haven't I.

 

[ashem0]

These are the little guys in my brooder right now. Just went to tuck them in for the night. They will be outside full time by the time these new eggs hatch. 4 barnyard chicks (3.5 weeks old), a mallard cross duckling (2.5 weeks old), a Muscovy duckling "cupcake" (10 days old) and a greyback gosling "ozzie" (2 weeks old).

See you after the weekend for candling!

They are terribly cute! I take it Cupcake and Ozzie are going to be pets?! Enjoy your weekend away Loopy12!

 

[ashem0]

I am *guessing* but I think the only problems with stacking would be
1. you would then have to turn by hand (it looks like you have an auto-turner)
2. enough air circulation around each egg for oxygen etc.


I crammed eggs into my incubator, and managed it by taking an egg carton, cutting out the bottoms as much as I could, and putting most of the eggs in the carton. I cut away as much of the carton as I could so that there would still be air circulation.

But..... in standing in the carton, they are definately closer together with less air circulation. I don't know.... we shall see!

Hi Alaskan, thanks for your suggestion about the carton. I don't think I need it at the moment with the way they are set up but will keep it in mind. Now, I'm more worried about the other end of the stick, when I have to stop turning the Isa's 3 days before the Marans. I'm thinking I will leave it as long as possible to put them all out on the Mesh... but then again it won't really matter, just so long as I manually rotate the Mrans right? In that case, I guess it really would not matter at all, if they were all sitting on the mesh now.. I could be manually rotating them all. And I could always put the Marans in a modifed 1/2 carton as you suggested to keep them safe from the hatching (hopefully) Isa's! Hmmm....

 

[Alaskan]

So much fun!


You sure you couldn't just duct tape your other thermometer in there somehow? If it is leaning on the eggs, will it keep the eggs from turning? Oh, bother. Maybe you do need a smaller one.

But then again, if the one you had inside, was agreeing well with the one on the machine, maybe you don't need a second one anyway.

And, with all of this talk about dry hatch, you shouldn't need to check humidity until right before lock down, right?

Loopy, don't worry, I don't have stacked egg cartons, just one egg carton....just that the eggs in an egg carton take up lots less space than eggs lying down. So, I have an 18 egg carton with 17 eggs, and then 5 eggs lying down (they didn't have clear small ends verses big ends)

And my egg turner was NOT working.... I hadn't thought to test that! Urg! So I had to open up the entire incubator, take out the turner, put the incubator back together and put the eggs back in.

It only took about a minute, so I think everything is OK temp wise, and I don't mind turning by hand.....

But for some odd reason it has gotten me to wondering..... Is my thermometer really accurate? Guess I will buy another one tomorrow.

 

[Alaskan]

Hi Alaskan, thanks for your suggestion about the carton. I don't think I need it at the moment with the way they are set up but will keep it in mind. Now, I'm more worried about the other end of the stick, when I have to stop turning the Isa's 3 days before the Marans. I'm thinking I will leave it as long as possible to put them all out on the Mesh... but then again it won't really matter, just so long as I manually rotate the Mrans right? In that case, I guess it really would not matter at all, if they were all sitting on the mesh now.. I could be manually rotating them all. And I could always put the Marans in a modifed 1/2 carton as you suggested to keep them safe from the hatching (hopefully) Isa's! Hmmm....

True, you could manually rotate them all. I don't think it would matter either way.

But the eggs have to be the same orientation for the entire incubation and hatch. So, if they are incubated on their side, they need to stay on their side. You can always make a small box setup for them, like you see when you buy a crate of wine bottles.

So when they are close to hatching, take out the turner and put little dividers around each egg.