The 4th Annual BYC Easter Hatch-a-long

[mommachick1]

I'm dead dog tired, been at it since 7am this morning & just sitting down. Moved the 22-3week old chicks to their new digs in the coop from the brooder. Moved broody & her eggs to a dog crate that I made all nice & cozy for her, & she started to go crazy & trampled on one of her eggs before I could get her out! Poor little chick only had 3 more days to go. It was gonna be a pretty one too. It was black & happened to me one of her own eggs too. Moved broody back out to her wall nest with her 6 remaining eggs. I guess I'll let her hatch them & then move the babies to the brooder. Speaking of which, I scrubbed down & disinfected the brooder for the upcoming chicks that should hatch on Easter. Oh, & then Anna-Bell one of my 3 EE hens has decided to go broody now. Normally she's my sweetest baby, but she sure does make a mean broody, yikes! Today is lockdown day, so I then candled the the 36 eggs in the incubator one last time to mark the air cells & pipping spot, took them off the egg turner & locked them down. My brother & his wife are driving from Chicago for a long weekend, so then I had to do some cleaning on the inside of the house. Too tired to even take a shower, not that I think I'll be able to get up out of this chair! LOL

 

[Bigfamily4me]

I have 51 eggs in lockdown. I've been having a hard time with temps regulating. Oh and then I unplugged the egg turner (because i was going to transfer eggs anyway) and found out 6 hrs later I unplugged the incubator instead!There's half my eggs. I have no idea what will hatch with this bunch!!!!!

 

[lizanne]

My eggs are moving!! It's so cool!! I ended up with 10 out of 12 going into lockdown. One was clear, and the other one quit around 5 days. That's not too. Bad for a first timer. Now to see how many we will have hatch.

 

[18Peeps]

One of ours started moving and peeping too . It seemed a little early, but it is so exciting to see them moving around. There is a little crack in the side...but I don't think it is enough to pierce the membrane yet. Hopefully the chick gets out okay. Waiting is so hard! I might not be able to stay up all night to watch, but I sure want to. Go Egg#3!! There appeared to be 8 developing when "lockdown" began and hopefully it will be a good hatch. 1st timer here and boy am I excited!

 

[mommachick1]

I had my first hatch ever on March 7th and had such a difficult time getting humidity above 59% & towards the end of that hatch I had a couple of shrink wrapped chicks I had to assist. Went into lock down tonight and now humidity way too high. How high is too high?

 

[myfivegirls]

Good Morning All!

"Slept" in the living room a few feet away from the incubator - got up several times to check on the eggs/chicks. Watched and videoed the 2nd chick hatching at midnight!

I now have 3 chicks and 7 pips! Two EEs and one Dominuque. I think "Michael Jessie" (Blue Andalusian/EE mix) is the dad to two of the chicks, because there's evidence of the "blue" gene.
The Dom mix is a beautiful silvery gray - can't wait to see how that feathers out with the barring gene in there too.
The 2nd EE (came from a green egg) is all yellow - no stripes and has a small rose comb

- that's strange because the only roo with a rose comb is the GLW, and he wasn't with any of the EEs during the week I collected eggs to hatch.
The three chicks are quite vigorous - they're hopping over the sides of the containers the eggs are separated in! At one point, they all hopped were snuggled together, side by side, resting their heads on the unhatched eggs.

I, too, I'm not sure if the humidity is too high. It's staying around 70% + but the window doesn't have any condensation. The first chick's back is still a little wet/sticky. (hatched 2/28 @ 7pm EST) Is that an indication that it's too humid in there? I thought it was supposed to be around 55%-65%.

Congrats to all the others who have pips and chicks! It's going to be a fun day! I'm so glad I took the day off.

 

[myfivegirls]

4th chick just hatched - another Dom x ! Two of its siblings are helping it keep warm and try to stand up.

 

[CherokeeFlats]

Happy Friday everyone!!! Day 20!!!!!!! Whoot

 

[Shellz]

Good morning all!!! Got up early to check the eggs & got an earful of some louder chirping! Yay! No pips yet. Soon.....

 

[noahsmom]

Good morning all!!! Got up early to check the eggs & got an earful of some louder chirping! Yay! No pips yet. Soon.....

Yay! Very soon!