Setting on Good Friday

[Hope119]

If eggs explode, at what "age" do they usually do so?

 

[Starryneedsmorebators]

i had one ouzing at only 4 days in

 

[Lotsapaints]

Quote:
Mostly you can smell them or see them weeping clearish stuff coming out of the shell if they smell don't try and open them in the house!I would place them in a plastic bag and put in the garbage. I always open my other ones that don't look right most of my bad ones are clear looks like a reg egg, scrambled ie broken yolk even eggs that have been in the incubator for 24 days don't smell that were clears and the ones that were blood rings never had any bad odor either. The thought of cleaning up the mess helps me toss eggs that might be bad.....

 

[Lynnk]

I had to cull about 12 eggs that weren't fertile...I think perhaps they were past the 10 day mark (since lay) as my hubby didn't mark the box. But sad. I still have loads that are developing though

I was at a poultry swap the other day talking with this guy about my home made incubators. He seemed extremely skeptical about the success of home made incubators, and I told him I 've already had one successful hatch. We got to the topic of candling and he went nuts telling me how horrible it is for the chick if you candle the egg! Made lots of "amateur" comments and went on and on, until I thanked him for his time and opinions

and moved on.

Does anyone have strong feelings about this? I know, probably a dumb question..everyone has strong feelings about all sorts of things.
I only candle them to see if they are fertile, and then again close to the end to see if there is movement.
Otherwise, I leave them alone except to turn them, or add water to the incubator.

thoughts?

 

[ilovechickens]

just candled on day 12, pulled 5 that were not doing nothing, the others seemed okay, from what I could tell, I did have one upside down:we will see how it does!!!

 

[Lotsapaints]

Does anyone have strong feelings about this? I know, probably a dumb question..everyone has strong feelings about all sorts of things.
I only candle them to see if they are fertile, and then again close to the end to see if there is movement.
Otherwise, I leave them alone except to turn them, or add water to the incubator.

well I candled mine a few at a time all the way to lock down only at night because the room was dark and I was hand turning them anyway. I hadn't done this in ages and really was worried that I couldn't tell anything....I can tell much better this time around and not looking at them as much but still I don't think it does any harm...now in my incubator that has a turner I only looked at those on day 4 going to look again on day 7 toss the bad ones and not look again till 18 days when I move them to the hatcher those are harder to look at is the only reason. I don't think I hurt my hatch 31 from 36 of shipped eggs is great the other batch I had 5 hatch from 15 I couldn't really look at those they were marans eggs very dark and the ones that didn't hatch were postal damage I think. Now if you kept the eggs out for 30 minutes...I could turn 41 eggs and look at 6-10 in less than 10 minutes and it never took long for my incubator to get right back to temperature.​

 

[Lynnk]

Sounds pretty much like what I do. I candle a few at night so I can see better, don't keep them out for long and it just helps me to cull the no-gos and check for movement if one seems overdue.
The guy was one of those who thinks he knows best and doesn't mind cramming it down your throat to try and make you feel bad...fortunately, it didn't make me feel bad, just a little concerned that I should check that he was just a blowhard and that I wasn't actually harming them.
thanks for your input.

 

[Mahonri]

The only time I candle "overdue" eggs is when I know they are past day 23. I saved two that way last hatch. I pipped for them and upped the humidity... and they hatched.

 

[Lynnk]

Same thing happened here.

 

[Hope119]

Quote:
I would love to hear what he had to say. I was thinking about it... I know (=believe) that ultrasound is not good for human babies and that human babies feel being watched, which they don't like and they to some extent don't yet feel like they are something "separate" from their mom. So I was thinking about egg candling too, that it is bright light that does not happen in natural circumstances when mother hen find dark and very private spot for this sort of thing... But incubator is already something not natural... can chicks even feel the light before they hatch? I know human babies can. So if it was me, I would have liked hearing an opinion on this from somebody who thinks he knows what he's talking about.