The 6th Annual BYC Easter Hatch-a-long!

[ronott1]

Hi @ronott1 I use the Brinsea last year and the results were good but not as great as I had expected. This year I purchased one from Maficfly and it works a lot better than Brinsea in terms of light intensity. At 17.99 its not too bad. There are only 2 cons I see:

a) Does not work with batteries. So if you have a power outage problem then not good for you
b) If you want to keep your hands free while examining the egg, thats not possible like in Brinsea.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KCKNYCY/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o06_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It is nice!

 

[Wisher1000]

 
I have a question. I have my greatest issues after the first chick or two has hatched. The toddling chicks spin and bump and rotate the other eggs in the hatcher. I have lost quite a few viable chicks because of this. What can I do to prevent this from happening again?

I highly recommend cut down styro egg cartons.  I use them ALL the time.  I cut the bottoms out and set the eggs in them in the hatcher with the largest part of the air cell pointing up.

The cartons, cut down....

The cartons, in use....

 

[Mama Bay]

I have used the grocery store strawberry containers since they have lids and air slots already in them. Oops I quoted the wrong person, I meant to quote Mama Bay.

Got it! I will start saving them now! Thanks

 

[ronott1]

Finally! The humidity has settled at 65% and the eggs are in. I would like it a bit lower, but I have tried everything to get it down. I still have some uncooked rice in a cup to help absorb excess moisture. I just put the eggs in so I will keep a close watch for the hour or say to make sure the temp and humidity stabilize quickly.

un popped popcorn absorbs more water than rice from the air.

Or the feminine pads.

 

[CowboysAngel]

As

As long as you have someplace you can lockdown and hatch, you can put them in whenever you like. I stagger all the time, as long as you keep track of who is due to go into the hatcher when, you can incubate different groups and different species with different hatch dates together.

Oh? I never thought of that, so if my bantys laid me some eggs I still have time to participate! Just rearrange eggs some, and mark the ones I put in today...and today's will count for HAL?

 

[Mama Bay]

The dollar store sells small shallow plastic baskets, used for organization of arts and crafts supplies. I line the bottoms with shelf grip liner, and if you can only fit two baskets, place eggs that you know the chicks will look different in together.
For example, I put my Faverolles with Marans because I know the Faverolles are fuzzy yellow and the Marans are black.
I don't put EE with brown leghorns because they are both chipmunk colored. If I were doing all four, I would put the EE with Faverolles and the Marans with the BL.
Whatever you can find would work just fine if it fits the right size for your incubator and you can line it with the shelf grip. You want the chicks legs to be able to stand without slipping.
If your chicks will look different enough, you may not even need baskets. I don't always use them.

Thanks! This is my first time and I have no idea what the chicks will look like... Guess I better start looking them up

though most are mixes so maybe I won't find much...

 

[Orpington Crazy]

I use the loom bands, the ones to make bracelets out of... there are neons, primary and pastel colors and I never had a prob with them fading too quickly... but I usually switch them off at a couple of weeks or so to colored zip ties...

Do you have any pictures of the bands on the chicks?

 

[Mama Bay]

Now I have a dumb newbie question. I would like to candle with the kids on day 4. Would that be Tuesday or Wednesday?

 

[Cynthia12]

I am so tempted to candle tomorrow. I know I probably shouldn't but all my eggs are questionable and I want to know ASAP if any will develop.

At this point, you won't see anything really. Just hang on, if you have to, pull a light egg on the 5th day, you may see some veining. But 7 days is the best day to start seeing what's up.

 

[Cynthia12]

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