Silkies - They’re simply SPECTACULAR!

[LadiesAndJane]

Hi @LynnaePB, quick question for you: you had mentioned in a previous post (way too hard to find it in all these pages ) that you often make a safety hole with valuable eggs. Eko is now chirping in the egg, I believe s(he) internally pipped around 10 pm my time, could have been sooner, but that is when I saw it. When should I a make the safety hole? It has been about 12 hours so far, I have waited too long in the past and I have also intervened too early in the past. I am trying to be a little more hands off, but I also do not want to lose this one surviving (so far) chick.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

I went ahead and made two small safety holes, one at the top of the egg and one along the natural zip line so I could see the chicks beak! I read that the one along the zip line could possible be occluded when the chick rotates, so that is why I made two. So far so good!

 

[thanai]

It's been a while since I posted here, but BIG NEWS...
FIRST silkie egg EVER!!!!!

I guess I had my dates wrong but I thought it wouldn't be for months!! So excited! I think it was my white silkie, Galadriel who laid it.

 

[Orpingtonsarecool]

Awesome congrats

 

[LadiesAndJane]

It's been a while since I posted here, but BIG NEWS...
FIRST silkie egg EVER!!!!! View attachment 2607596

I guess I had my dates wrong but I thought it wouldn't be for months!! So excited! I think it was my white silkie, Galadriel who laid it.

Congratulations!

 

[PioneerChicks]

It's been a while since I posted here, but BIG NEWS...
FIRST silkie egg EVER!!!!! View attachment 2607596

I guess I had my dates wrong but I thought it wouldn't be for months!! So excited! I think it was my white silkie, Galadriel who laid it.

Yay! It's beautiful!

 

[thanai]

Thanks everyone I'll tell her you said congrats

How are all your flocks doing this week?

 

[PioneerChicks]

Thanks everyone I'll tell her you said congrats

How are all your flocks doing this week?

Great, except 3/4 went broody. Just when I started collecting eggs for someone. They have a perfect sense of timing!

 

[LynnaePB]

I went ahead and made two small safety holes, one at the top of the egg and one along the natural zip line so I could see the chicks beak! I read that the one along the zip line could possible be occluded when the chick rotates, so that is why I made two. So far so good!

Sorry I didn't get your post earlier! It sounds like you've got things covered though! The hole on top is important for the reason you mentioned and it's always nice to see the beak too.

I kind of go overboard with the safety holes at times. I've added them as early as 4 hours or so after internal pip to maybe 15 or so hours after internal pip. I've lost chicks around the 17th hour mark before so I never wait the 24 hours you are supposed to.

Even adding them very early I haven't had a problem with shrink wrap because of safety holes (once I add them I try to keep my humidity 65-75% which seems to work well). Probably a good percent of the eggs I give safety holes to didn't need them but it doesn't seem to hurt them and it's saved lots of malpositioned chicks so I likely won't stop anytime soon. I have lost only a few shipped egg babies that had safety holes after internal pip but I'm fairly certain it wasn't because of those safety holes being there (they weren't shrink wrapped and had no obvious cause of death).

I'm so happy to hear Eko managed an internal pip! Praying everything goes smoothly from here for her (or him)!

 

[LynnaePB]

It's been a while since I posted here, but BIG NEWS...
FIRST silkie egg EVER!!!!! View attachment 2607596

I guess I had my dates wrong but I thought it wouldn't be for months!! So excited! I think it was my white silkie, Galadriel who laid it.

Congratulations!!!

I still get excited when I get a new silkie layer! Some of my grow outs from last fall recently started up, lots of them seem to be starting around 6 months old.