Setting the week of August 22 (or so... ) Everyone join!! You know you want to!

[Wrightsx4]

Day 12. Pretty certain I only have two at this point. These two are getting really dark and covering about half the egg now but I can see them squirming. Both are faverolles. The americauna egg, I think our eyes are playing tricks on us. Like several other eggs I can see a dark shadow but nothing else...yolk? Air sacs are all over the place. Even the two developing have air sacs that are really weird looking. I can't compare them to the diagrams I've seen for sizes at 7,14,18 days. I sure hope at least the two hatch successfully.

 

[swirler]

Fourteen hours of full blackout later, I find myself wondering: will affected embryos be dead immediately, or will they fail to hatch/hatch and die early/all of the above?

 

[wahmommy]

wow swirler-what terrible luck- so the incubator was off for 14 hours? I'm a newbie so I don't know, but maybe someone will chime in- did you search posts about power outages and how they affected hatch?

 

[chicksooner]

Fourteen hours of full blackout later, I find myself wondering: will affected embryos be dead immediately, or will they fail to hatch/hatch and die early/all of the above?

Oh no! I know I have read that cool down time is ok. Momma hen will even get off the nest for a while every day. If it were me I would get the temp and humidity back up and see how everyone does.

 

[wahmommy]

I just found this by searching power outage:

Info on power outages during Incubation.
From- A Guide to Raising Chickens by Gail Damerow

The more valuable your hatching eggs are, the more likely it is that the electricity will go out during incubation. If you have an uninterruptable power source (UPS) for your computer or other electronic equipment, consider disconnecting the usual equipment and using the UPS to power your incubator. If the outage comtinues beyond its capacity to keep your incubator running, or you don't have an UPS, open the incubator and let the eggs cool until the power goes back on.

Trying to keep the eggs warm is likely to cause abnormal embryo development. Furthermore, if you close the vents or wrap the incubator with blankets in your attempt to keep eggs warm, a greater danger than temperature loss is oxygen deprivation. Developing embryos use up oxygen rather rapidly, and the oxygen level may soon fall below that necessary to keep them alive.

As soon as the power goes back on, close the incubator and continue operating it as usual. The effect of the outage on your hatch will depend on how long the power was out and on how long the eggs had been incubated before the outage. A power failure of up to 12 hours may not significally affect the hatch (except to delay it somewhat), especially if the outage occurred during the early incubation, when cooled embryos naturally tend to go dormant. Embryos that are close to term generate enough heat to carry them through a short-term outage.

 

[swirler]

I'd read about power outages well in advance (it pays to be aware!) and spent the blackout time juggling hot water bottles and blankets and so on - but it was a pretty bad storm and cold weather, so the air temp in the bator did dip as low as 28. We briefly had power halfway through the blackout, so the temp got back up to 37.7 fast at that time; then dipped to 32 in the second wave of outage.

I can confirm that it hasn't killed the embryos outright, but 28 is on the low side, so fingers crossed I guess. Wondering if I should delay lockdown a day.

I get the idea of letting eggs cool if it's early in incubation, but at day 14 I can't see the physiological logic.

 

[swirler]

..

 

[barnyardmommy]

Well I'm down to 3 eggs. 1 Cochin and 2 Dominique's. My broody hen crushed 1 egg, and 4 were duds. I have moved them in to my Little Giant bator. Wish these 3 luck.....

 

[DustinT]

We candler last night, I'm down to 39 eggs. Next weekend we are going to inject dye into a few if everything works out.

Inject dye? Please explain.

Swirler, Sorry to hear about your outage. I hope everything hatches out ok. We had a crazy storm last night too, but thankfully didn't lose power. Good luck.

 

[outdoorsii]

Well, I candled my eggs today, it's almost day 11 now. Out of 30 eggs, 22 are definately perfect & growing right; lotsa veins, lil heartbeats, black dots!!

Me & my dad didn't really want bannys, since it takes like 7 of them to make an omelet LOL, but since it was our 1st hatch, got 7 free banny eggs from Marty a friend I found here that works in LR

! The banny's are from a BB Red rooster & Nankin hens; plus he gave us 3 Jersey giant eggs, but neither of us were sure if they were fertile, b/c his pullets are barely 9 mon.'s. I think & for Jersery giants thats pretty good layin at that age, 2 were thrown out they weren't fertile, 1's still in the incubator b/c I can barely see through the egg.., but today (day 12 - i'm editing this; I think I SAW VEINING & air sac & maybe something in there!!!! YAY!!!)

Anyways, we had 12 Australorps that we ordered from a guy in Missouri through Ebay, order was for 10, he gave us 2 extra thank goodness b/c 2 weren't fertile &2 had blood rings

, so we have 8/12 australorps that're good.

Then Marty also gave me 8 huge eggs that were from a Jersey Giant rooster & Barred rock hens & his Prod. Red hens, so those will be mixed breeds, & 7/8 of those are perfect, 1 was infertile I think.

So yea, right now we have 23 in the incubator