Silkie Holiday Hatch-a-long

[chicken pickin]

okay, another question prior to arrival of my incubator and eggs.... when you candle your eggs and weigh them do you wear latex gloves or anything or is just washing your hands enough? and just washing hands or washing with antibacterial soap?

another thought... after shipped eggs are received I will let them set for 24 hours, it says in a styrafoam egg carton with holes cut out of bottom, do I need to santize this carton as well?

thanks for putting up with my neurosis... lol

I don't wear latex gloves and most of the time I forget to wash my hands before handling eggs. I also don't sanitize cartons. I figure my broodies can get 95-100% hatch rate and the broody doesn't sanitize her nest box

so Im not over cautious with handling the eggs.

 

[why do birds]

okay, another question prior to arrival of my incubator and eggs.... when you candle your eggs and weigh them do you wear latex gloves or anything or is just washing your hands enough? and just washing hands or washing with antibacterial soap?

another thought... after shipped eggs are received I will let them set for 24 hours, it says in a styrafoam egg carton with holes cut out of bottom, do I need to santize this carton as well?

thanks for putting up with my neurosis... lol

When our eggs arrived we washed our hands with regular soap and water, dried them good, unwrapped the eggs from the bubble wrap and placed them into a regular egg carton. We didn't cut out holes or anything. We placed the egg carton onto a towel on top of a piece of cardboard on the kitchen counter because the countertop is stone and we didn't want the eggs to get really cold. Since our eggs were older, some more than 8 days, we placed them into the incubator after sitting only about 8 hours.
We have an alcohol gel hand sanitizer that we kept by the incubator. We would hand sanitize prior to touching the eggs. I was concerned about transmitting any "human" germs to the eggs, even though we are all pretty healthy. We would wash with regular soap and water. Our eggs were very clean but we still did wash our hands. We didn't wear gloves.

 

[jorey]

I am having a hard time not candeling. Day 7 isn't till Sunday but I sooooooo want to peek. I've been good and haven't touched anyrhing yet. Temps are stayimg the same humidity is now at 34. So far I'm impressed with my farmers innovator. Been stable as can be since I plugged it in last Friday. I received white, black, splash, bbs, and paint eggs. Lots of paint. That's what I'm really hoping hatches. I love the multi- colored. I was out with mine the other day and noticed that one of my white hens has one tiny blotch of black feathers on her. They are black down to the base. Would that make her a paint? All my whites were silver based as chicks so I'm assuming that makes them recessive white. I can't remember what I read on here. I've read so much and genetics is not my thing. Lol

 

[luvmypets]

Today is lockdown , for silkie mama. Also our other silkie went broody

 

[Classy Chick]

I am officially done with this batch. Three more chicks have hatched, all died within the first 12 hours. They all seemed to be sluggish and would have sort of spams. One seemed fine but I woke up this morning and it was gone. Thank you all for your kind words of encouragement. At least now I know that my roos are related to my hens in some way. No more chicks for them. My little Christmas miracle chick is growing like a weed and is ver happy. Un plugging the bator today though, I don't want to put any more chicks through what the past ones have

I am not done hatching though, and after this I will be looking for white silkie eggs to try again! They don't have to be fancy show quaility, heck they don't even need five toes. I just love their attitudes and the way they look. Is MyPetChicken a good site to look on? Because I was also thinking about throwing some different breeds in the bator as well. Thank you guys again for all of your help, it has been invaluable!

 

[jorey]

So sorry classy. Hopefully next will go better.

 

[why do birds]

Oh Classy! That's terrible news. What about finding someone close to you to get the eggs from? Shipping must take a toll. It does seem better to be able to get the eggs closer to home. So sorry.

 

[luvmypets]

Sorry for your loss

 

[luvmypets]

My hatch is in lockdown. Sorry about your loss

 

[howfunkyisurchicken]

^ Good luck with lockdown! And to everyone else incubating

It looks as though I'll be joining you all, if that's okay? We just recently moved and I only got to bring 5 of my chickens with me

I brought 4 of my B/B/S Silkies and a black Sizzle. Anyway, my new coop is quite large and very empty looking and my husband actually encouraged me to hatch a few eggs. My girls are laying surprisingly well considering the move, short days and recent cold snap. I've got a few more days to collect eggs but decided to calibrate my thermometer and hygrometer and get the incubator stabilized today.
I've never hatched from my current rooster so I'm just collecting a dozen or so eggs for a small test hatch. He's black and he's covering 2 splash and 1 blue Silkie and the black Sizzle. Hopefully he makes pretty babies