Sexing eggs???

[bantamrooster]

I expect it will never be an accepted method as their are so many variables at play. I just find it very interesting that some people report very good success rates. I need to test it much more myself to see if I will be one of those lucky few consistently or not.

It will never be accepted because it doesnt work.
Have you paid close attention to what eggs certain hens of yours lay? Do they lay some pointed and some rounded eggs or fairly consistant one way or the other?
I think you should check into it more yourself.
You should also mark eggs laid on even numbered days as male and ones laid on odd number days as females. Also flip a coin and mark eggs heads for males or tails for females.
Hatch and check the results. I bet all three methods result in about the same accuracy.
About 50%

 

[josy]

It will never be accepted because it doesnt work.
Have you paid close attention to what eggs certain hens of yours lay? Do they lay some pointed and some rounded eggs or fairly consistant one way or the other?
I think you should check into it more yourself.
You should also mark eggs laid on even numbered days as male and ones laid on odd number days as females. Also flip a coin and mark eggs heads for males or tails for females.
Hatch and check the results. I bet all three methods result in about the same accuracy.
About 50%

In an earlier post you said you were running an experiment. I'm wondering why you bother if you are so sure egg shape sexing doesn't work? To answer your question, yes I have a few hens that I know for sure which eggs are theirs and they do vary from more rounded to more pointy. They do have the same rough shape but there are differences in roundness. If there is even I chance I will end up with with more pullets I'm willing to try it since it's not going to hurt anything.

 

[Robyn1968]

Sorry to bomb this post but how do I start a new thread? Am on mobile phone android I have tried everything

 

[Robyn1968]

I have a very interesting question about a young silky/bantam that is super healthy but very shy and won't leave it's mother after 4 months. Also makes strange noise unlike anything else. Like it's scared??

 

[bantamrooster]

In an earlier post you said you were running an experiment. I'm wondering why you bother if you are so sure egg shape sexing doesn't work? To answer your question, yes I have a few hens that I know for sure which eggs are theirs and they do vary from more rounded to more pointy. They do have the same rough shape but there are differences in roundness. If there is even I chance I will end up with with more pullets I'm willing to try it since it's not going to hurt anything.

Im with you. I so wish it worked. I could be hatching pullet eggs and eating cockerel eggs. Life would be grand.
This idea is an old wives tale. I first heard it probably 30 years ago and many times over the years since. It comes up here a couple times a year at least. I tried it a few times way back then and it was no more accurate then just guessing.
There have been others here that have tried it.
I know how it comes to be that a chick ends up the sex it does and it has nothing to do with the egg or its shape. And eggs dont take different shapes according to what sex the chick inside is. It just doesnt work that way. Again i too so wished it did.
I meant i was working on a project group of birds. Not trying this egg shape experiment.
I hatch a lot of eggs. Most all are from small breeding groups. When im working with a pen sitb one , two or three hens you really do get used to what their eggs look like. At this time i see the same hens laying the same shape eggs over and over again. I dont see hens laying half rounded and half pointed eggs. That in itself tells me this method doesnt work.
Im hatching eggs from two silkies right now and every egg has been so round that im second guessing myself wether im even getting them in the turners with the right sides up. Believe me im looking very closely at them to find a pointy end. Not like some are slightly pointed and some slightly rounded more.
The project im working on is one that carries a sex linked gene so the hatch different colors by sex. Im keeping track of every hen and what they hatch. I'll be splitting them into two groups next. A group to keep cockerels from and a group to keep pullets from to cross together. Since i know which hens lay which eggs and what hatches from eacb its easy to see if they match this method at all and so far they dont.
I have one hen that lays pointed eggs and ive hatched more pullets from them then cockerels. I have two hens that lay really rounded eggs. Ive hatched more cockerels from them. The hens lay the same shape eggs over and over. Every now and again one would be slightly different but no where close to one hen laying half rounded and half pointed eggs.
Since i will be having a pen for cockerels and a pen for pullets in the near future ive been keeping track just out of curiosity if one hen produces more males or more females. That has not been the case so far either.
I do hope you try the method for yourself. Youre right it wont hurt to try. And im all for more people hatching eggs so any reason to get someone to get eggs in an incubator is a good reason in my book.

 

[dekel18042]

Quote:
I hatch a lot of eggs. Most all are from small breeding groups. When im working with a pen sitb one , two or three hens you really do get used to what their eggs look like. At this time i see the same hens laying the same shape eggs over and over again. I dont see hens laying half rounded and half pointed eggs. That in itself tells me this method doesnt work.
Im hatching eggs from two silkies right now and every egg has been so round that im second guessing myself wether im even getting them in the turners with the right sides up. Believe me im looking very closely at them to find a pointy end. Not like some are slightly pointed and some slightly rounded more.
The project im working on is one that carries a sex linked gene so the hatch different colors by sex. Im keeping track of every hen and what they hatch. I'll be splitting them into two groups next. A group to keep cockerels from and a group to keep pullets from to cross together. Since i know which hens lay which eggs and what hatches from eacb its easy to see if they match this method at all and so far they dont.
I have one hen that lays pointed eggs and ive hatched more pullets from them then cockerels. I have two hens that lay really rounded eggs. Ive hatched more cockerels from them. The hens lay the same shape eggs over and over. Every now and again one would be slightly different but no where close to one hen laying half rounded and half pointed eggs.
Since i will be having a pen for cockerels and a pen for pullets in the near future ive been keeping track just out of curiosity if one hen produces more males or more females. That has not been the case so far either.
I do hope you try the method for yourself. Youre right it wont hurt to try. And im all for more people hatching eggs so any reason to get someone to get eggs in an incubator is a good reason in my book.
About 55 years ago Mother Earth News did an article on sexing eggs which many people took as gospel. It has since been debunked and even the magazine retracted it with more accurate articles.
Ever since I started hatching several years ago, I kept records. I get both pointed and round eggs but prefer the rounder or more egg shaped ones in the incubator. They position better.
I can tell which hen laid each egg. And although I was inadvertently selecting for eggs purported to be female, my own hatches are heavy on the male side.

This last hatch was case in point. 10/17 boys. But what I have noticed is that certain individuals or breeds give me better results. Included in that prior number were 7/10 girls for one breed of hens. Think I may hatch more of their eggs.
On the other hand my favorite Easter eggers which lay gorgeous eggs are really heavy on the boys. only 3/10 girls there.
I recently read that Germany has devised a way to sex "eggs." They're experimenting in large hatcheries, once the egg has started developing, but before hatching, a minute hole is placed in the egg and the developing fetus can be tested, but at this point it is too new and you would need a large hatchery to make this feasible once it becomes available. But it's a start.

 

[bantamrooster]

Yes i read about the germans sexing eggs a few days into incubation. Bet big hatcheries are very excited with following that process. It will be a game changer.
I had some legbars for a while and they hatched about 75% males.
I also recently hatched some leghorns and got 4 females and 11 males.
Im gonna start tracking individual hens more closely to see what they hatch and can also do breed by breed.
I could believe a certain hen could produce more of one sex then the other and even certain breeds could. Im sure its all just luck of draw when it comes down to it.

 

[josy]

http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-635X2013000300006

Here is a link to a study that was done on egg shape determining sex, they also included size and volume in the study. It's a bit hard to understand in spots with all the scientific jargon but worth a read.
They used 300 eggs collected on the same day from the same breed. Size and volume had no determining effect but shape had a significant effect on determining sex. It was also mentioned that different breeds had different ratios in shape for determining sex.

 

[josy]

Here's a pic of eggs laid by the same hen a few days apart. I can see why sexing by shape doesn't work for some people if your hens don't have a difference like this in their eggs. I'm thinking that it may be similar to feather sexing( doesn't work on all breeds).

 

[bantamrooster]

http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-635X2013000300006

Here is a link to a study that was done on egg shape determining sex, they also included size and volume in the study. It's a bit hard to understand in spots with all the scientific jargon but worth a read.
They used 300 eggs collected on the same day from the same breed. Size and volume had no determining effect but shape had a significant effect on determining sex. It was also mentioned that different breeds had different ratios in shape for determining sex.

I couldnt make any sense out of that