Sigh... The end is near
I disinfected and put away all but one incubator and one hatcher a little while back, (man that took some MAJOR willpower on my part, lol) and I just put the last batch of eggs in the remaining still set-up hatcher this morning. So in a few days I will officially be DONE incubating and hatching for the year
Yep, for the YEAR. Done. I'm sure I could still get a few more batches of fertile eggs from a friend of mine who lives in a much cooler area than I do, but no, not gonna... cuz I'm DONE!!!!!
My hatch count is at 775 right now (not including the 12 Ring Neck Pheasants I hatched out too!). Obviously I won't make it to 800 keets for 2011, but good gawd, who encouraged me to take it THIS far as it is!?!?! 500 keets was my original goal, see what you guys did!?!?! It's all your fault!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This last batch of eggs was just mainly an experiment anyway (yah sure)... I just happened to have had 41 eggs sitting in my egg storage area staring at me for about 1 1/2-2 weeks after I decided I was not going to set any more eggs this year, so they did not get turned and a lot of them were around 16 days old when I finally did decide to set them... on a whim (more like moment of weakness, cuz I'm a hatching addict and YES I ADMIT IT, I FELL OFF THE darn WAGON
)... But apparently turning/tilting is pretty important when it comes to storing Guinea eggs for more than 7-10 days. (Altho some of this batch did come from a flock that has not been real fertile late in this season... which I am sure did not help my viable egg count at all
).
So anyway.... out of 41 eggs I have only a measly 10 eggs that look like they might hatch (2 were iffy, but I moved them over too, I seriously doubt they will hatch tho)
That was barely worth running the incubator for, but oh well, I learned that eggs laid towards the end of the laying season here definitely lack fertility and they BETTER get turned if you want them to hatch, lol.
I'll post pics of whatever hatches. I'm expecting mostly mixed Lavenders and Pied Lavenders, maybe a couple Royal Purples and some Pearl Greys... I doubt I'll be lucky enough to get another Buff or Opaline
And just for the record I am refusing to help ANY of these keets hatch, if they are not strong enough and determined enough to get out of those thick hard shells all on their own, then tuff noogies
(I'm going to make it a point not to be home during the hatch, lol).
I disinfected and put away all but one incubator and one hatcher a little while back, (man that took some MAJOR willpower on my part, lol) and I just put the last batch of eggs in the remaining still set-up hatcher this morning. So in a few days I will officially be DONE incubating and hatching for the year
My hatch count is at 775 right now (not including the 12 Ring Neck Pheasants I hatched out too!). Obviously I won't make it to 800 keets for 2011, but good gawd, who encouraged me to take it THIS far as it is!?!?! 500 keets was my original goal, see what you guys did!?!?! It's all your fault!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This last batch of eggs was just mainly an experiment anyway (yah sure)... I just happened to have had 41 eggs sitting in my egg storage area staring at me for about 1 1/2-2 weeks after I decided I was not going to set any more eggs this year, so they did not get turned and a lot of them were around 16 days old when I finally did decide to set them... on a whim (more like moment of weakness, cuz I'm a hatching addict and YES I ADMIT IT, I FELL OFF THE darn WAGON
So anyway.... out of 41 eggs I have only a measly 10 eggs that look like they might hatch (2 were iffy, but I moved them over too, I seriously doubt they will hatch tho)
I'll post pics of whatever hatches. I'm expecting mostly mixed Lavenders and Pied Lavenders, maybe a couple Royal Purples and some Pearl Greys... I doubt I'll be lucky enough to get another Buff or Opaline
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