I'm new to BYC, but I've been reading all sorts of posts on here for about a year now to help me with my chickens. I finally made an incubator out of a styrofoam ice chest, and set 7 eggs... got 4 live babies.
They were born March 9th and 10th.
I built a larger incubator and using my previous numbers, set 35 eggs to get 20 chicks. I set them as they were laid by my 9 hens, over the course of 5 days (the three I lost in my first batch were set a day after they were laid, so It could have been because I don't have 'storage' figured out....) Hopefully there won't be a problem hatching babies out for 5-6 days.
In my first batch, the babies dried off fairly quickly and I was able to get them out while waiting for the others to hatch. So far, through candling, I have caught and discarded 4 dud eggs, and have a possible 3 more that may not be viable. I have 28 I believe to still be viable, so I can technically lose up to 8 more and still get my 20 babies.
If I can figure out how to upload pictures, I would love to show off my peeps.... Oh, and I uploaded the video of my 'first born' onto Youtube.... if anyone is interested.
I never realized how large this forum community is... I'm very glad it's here! Now I know I'm not alone in my chicken addiction.
