Staggered hatching Hatch-A-Long

[Lins_BE]

 

[julskinka]

Also I don't think I mentioned because a good number of you are participating in the March HAL too, but I'm lurking here because I am doing an unexpected staggered hatch. For those who aren't on that thread, I had a variety of eggs come (mostly BBSCM, partridge orps, olive eggers, and some local CCL crosses), but while absolutely everything else developed, the BBSCMs were all infertile, so the breeder sent replacements (and also more blue/green eggs). They're 13 days behind the initial batch, which are due to hatch on Friday.

I've done staggered hatches before, but it was of the "I have more eggs than I can fit in my incubator, so I'll just put these in as clears get pulled out" variety. That's actually gone surprisingly well for me. My craziest result was a shipped egg that hatched out 2+ weeks after its peers that went in first. On brand, she's an "olive egger" that lays brown eggs, when she darn well pleases.

 

[julskinka]

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Squeeeeee!!! Got at least one cute little girl there!

 

[Lins_BE]

I’m thinking 4 girls and 2 boys. But not sure yet.

 

[Lins_BE]

Also I don't think I mentioned because a good number of you are participating in the March HAL too, but I'm lurking here because I am doing an unexpected staggered hatch. For those who aren't on that thread, I had a variety of eggs come (mostly BBSCM, partridge orps, olive eggers, and some local CCL crosses), but while absolutely everything else developed, the BBSCMs were all infertile, so the breeder sent replacements (and also more blue/green eggs). They're 13 days behind the initial batch, which are due to hatch on Friday.

I've done staggered hatches before, but it was of the "I have more eggs than I can fit in my incubator, so I'll just put these in as clears get pulled out" variety. That's actually gone surprisingly well for me. My craziest result was a shipped egg that hatched out 2+ weeks after its peers that went in first. On brand, she's an "olive egger" that lays brown eggs, when she darn well pleases.

So happy you joyned us. It’s my first year of staggered hatching and I’m learning as I go.

i chose to do staggered hatching since I want to try out different breeds this year. I don’t want 40 peeps at once since I can’t be as invested in each one seperately when there are so many. Also, I aa hatching addict and this way I have new babiesevery week.

I will be keeping a few hens and a roo of every hatch and sell the rest of them to finance my chick addiction.

so, how do you work with the hatching? I have a chinese incubator that I incubate in and I love it! Then I have a home made aquarium incubator to hatch them in. This batch was the first in the homemade aqua-bator and it worked out very well after some initial glitches I needed to work out.

I am pondering now on how to brood the new chicks. I have another big aquarium to put the newly hatched in and bought a big rabbits cage yesterday that I’m picking up on wednesday to put them in after the first week where I will be putting the 2 weeks old in and maybe also the 3 weeks old to integrate them with the older ones right away. I have to see how it goes. I don’t want them in the house after that so I got my hands on a very large terrarium to move them after 3 weeks. I hope this will do to keep them week 4/5, then move them week 6/7 to the lower part of the terrarium that I will be turning into brooder space, now it’s only leggs. at that point I want them to do some grass hopping in a little seperate movable run. and week 8 they need to go in a seperate space of the chicken coop where they will self-integrate with panic doors. This is at a pretty late age for me since I usually let them self-integrate from week 5. But we’ve been losing some to the crows and hawks that way so I want them to be a bit older this year to see how that goes.
Here are some pics of the hatcher and brooders.

 

[Mvan42]

Well lockdown tomorrow for the first batch... putting the second batch on lock down also. I have a few wonky mis formed air cells in them. One looks to be close to half the size of the shell detached.. worried about that one. Not sure if it will make it..

 

[julskinka]

Well lockdown tomorrow for the first batch... putting the second batch on lock down also. I have a few wonky mis formed air cells in them. One looks to be close to half the size of the shell detached.. worried about that one. Not sure if it will make it..

My batch-1 "lockdown" is todaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!

 

[Lins_BE]

My batch-1 "lockdown" is todaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!

Good luck!

 

[julskinka]

So happy you joyned us. It’s my first year of staggered hatching and I’m learning as I go.

i chose to do staggered hatching since I want to try out different breeds this year. I don’t want 40 peeps at once since I can’t be as invested in each one seperately when there are so many. Also, I aa hatching addict and this way I have new babiesevery week.

I will be keeping a few hens and a roo of every hatch and sell the rest of them to finance my chick addiction.

so, how do you work with the hatching? I have a chinese incubator that I incubate in and I love it! Then I have a home made aquarium incubator to hatch them in. This batch was the first in the homemade aqua-bator and it worked out very well after some initial glitches I needed to work out.

I am pondering now on how to brood the new chicks. I have another big aquarium to put the newly hatched in and bought a big rabbits cage yesterday that I’m picking up on wednesday to put them in after the first week where I will be putting the 2 weeks old in and maybe also the 3 weeks old to integrate them with the older ones right away. I have to see how it goes. I don’t want them in the house after that so I got my hands on a very large terrarium to move them after 3 weeks. I hope this will do to keep them week 4/5, then move them week 6/7 to the lower part of the terrarium that I will be turning into brooder space, now it’s only leggs. at that point I want them to do some grass hopping in a little seperate movable run. and week 8 they need to go in a seperate space of the chicken coop where they will self-integrate with panic doors. This is at a pretty late age for me since I usually let them self-integrate from week 5. But we’ve been losing some to the crows and hawks that way so I want them to be a bit older this year to see how that goes.
Here are some pics of the hatcher and brooders.
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Your set up is significantly fancier than mine! I only have the one incubator (an Incuview) in my bedroom, and one permanent brooder (built out of old ikea parts) in my sunroom, so everyone gets incubated, hatched, and brooded together. I also build a small temporary brooder out of a cardboard box that I can keep inside right by the incubator until everyone's about 48 hours old and definitely looking hale. I may keep them inside a bit longer this time because it's still pretty chilly in my sunroom.

I took the automatic turner out when I put the second batch in on D13 and am just turning batch-2 by hand. I'm considering making a divider today to keep the two batches separate at hatch-1. My humidity overall is very low, so it doesn't seem to negatively affect the later eggs to be in a higher humidity for a couple of days during hatching.

Once there are three babies in there, I'll start by taking out two and putting them in the temp brooder, but always leaving at least one to stay behind and encourage the others. I think this limits the amount of violence being wreaked on the remaining eggs. Once everyone's done hatching, I'll put the automatic turner back in for the Batch-2, until their D14.

 

[Mvan42]

My batch-1 "lockdown" is todaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!

Jealous