Setting Feb 16, want to join in>Hatch-Along

[hokankai]

I candled some of the eggs from my flock and a lot of them appear to be infertile. Thank goodness because I was staring at the 48 eggs in there and thinking, "what have I done? O_O" Hahaha

Bad news is that my sultan laid her first egg and I stuck it in the incubator because I want a sultan/silkie mix. It appears to be infertile. However I got her second egg today and cracked it open...fertile. Dang it! Oh well.

 

[DraigAthar]

Absolutely. What breeds?

Dominiques, with two possible crossbreed eggs in the mix. I figure it'll be easy to tell when they hatch, because the possible crossbreeds would have come from a salmon faverolle I have in the pen with the dominiques right now, so her chicks would hatch out with five toes and be easy to spot, heh! But otherwise they are all Doms.

 

[heyheypaula]

OKAY! So I have no self control and I couldn't resist candling my eggs at day 5! Here's what I found:

YEAH BLUE SILKIE!!!!

YEAH BELGIAN QUAIL ANTWERP
I think it is developing and will continue to do so..

Maybe my Lavender Orpington is developing? At first I thought it was a blood ring but I can see a smattering of veins at one end. So maybe?!

Here's one of the many eggs thats not developing, it looks like the air sac was shaken and made two? Bifurcated?

Here's another..

Overall I'm excited to see any growth! I'm going to check again on thurs (day 7) with some friends (I promised) and again on day 10. I guess I'll cull the ones not developing then and take a look at them.. So far it looks like all my blue silkies are developing! Unfortunately none of the red silkies or the barnevelders. A couple of the belgian antwerp quail too though! Hopefully my lavender orpington and a couple of the blues. I tried one of the marans but I couldn't see anything through that shell so who knows. I'm just excited to see any signs of life!

 

[maryhysong]

The more the merrier! Whether under a broody hen or in an incubator. I love it when I candle and see the veins and then to see them jumping around in there is so cool! That water bottle idea is great; I think I am going to do that too! Thanks.

 

[frankensusan]

Oh man! You guys! I went and ordered another little giant. For $34 I couldn't make one! Well it's a good thing because I set some more eggs after a candling that I don't think went well at all. But if some of them are developing then I'll have a 7 day spread for hatching, so... another incubator. I have only a tiny bit of hope for the cochins, but I'm not taking them out until they stink. They are porous so it's hard for me to figure out what I'm seeing with my homemade candler, I can't even find the air cells (they were shipped cross country so...) . Hmm... Maybe I need another candler. I have like 3 thermo/hygro in the current bator.. OMG I'm going to need more! yikes!

I can only really keep 4-6 adult birds in the end. LOL hooo boy. Good thing I know other people who want birds!

What to do today while avoiding candling? hmm... make a new spreadsheet, clean the room, order another thermo/hygrometer, oh I could try to calibrate some of my 'meters'. Look at more pics of other people's candling. Try to find the perfect software for tracking incubator / egg progress for my android phone.

Now I remember one of the reasons I got out of the chicken keeping for a year. I get a TINY bit obsessive.

I really need to move to the country.

Am I the only one who could not resist candling ?

Susan

 

[McPhersonFarm]

I'd like to join I set some on the 12th and some the 17th and a few in between LOL! This is what I have cooking

2 Red Golden Pheasant (I had 3 but broke the ONLY one that looked developing good while candling - I was sick )
2 African Geese
6 Barnyard mix (our friend gave them to us to eat LOL but 4 of 6 are developing!)
4 Silver Bantam (my first of my own eggs to incubate!)
12 Buff Orpingtons
4 from the local little store (my fiance wanted to see what happened LOL)
25 Cotournix quail 4 bobwhite quail


I bought a little giant for 34 to use as my hatcher since I'm doing staggered hatches (before I would remove rows from my turner but always had to keep watch when chicks hatch that they didn't get stuck!~)

I'm a hopeless candling junkie I'm afraid. I find it hard not to candle daily. Both my geese are developing nicely, 2 of the 4 bantams look great (the other two were set later), 4/6 barnyard are doing good and the rest were set just a couple days ago so nothing yet

 

[pcreel]

I started the evening of the 15th, but added some yesterday and today (hooray for staggered hatches... ). This is my second hatch and I'm going big! Have 48 eggs in there. 15 banty mixes from my flock, which will mostly be infertile because my silkie wasn't doing a very good job of mating, haha. (girls are silkies, d'anver, d'uccle, silkie/serma mix, and sultan) 13 bantam barred rocks 9 bantam BBS cochins 6 bantam polish 6 bantam sizzle suprises 5 Araucana for a local lady Woot!

 

[pcreel]

If you don't mind me asking, souls I have water bottles inn my LG too?
My eggs need al the help they can get.
Also what is your thermometer in?
Thanks
Patty

 

[pcreel]

Sorry for the typos.
Its should I have three water bottles.

 

[hokankai]

Sorry for the typos.
Its should I have three water bottles.

I don't think you'd need 3, but if you're worried you can try. I don't think it will hurt anything besides taking up space.

That thermometer is in a water wiggler or water weasel toy. It's there to give me a fairly accurate temperature reading of the inside of the eggs since the toy is filled with water. I prefer to go off of that than the other thermometers because the inside egg temperature is the most important reading . It's been reading almost exactly 99.5 too, except right now because I forgot to warm up the water I just added, lol.