Trader Joes & Other Grocery Store Egg Hatching Club - Are you a Member

[ApplestoApples]

Ok.Thanks

 

[kapie9969]

Mabe trader joes,but the box of brown eggs at my health store is labeled fertililized eggs.And they arent leghorns.

 

[Moonkit]

Mabe trader joes,but the box of brown eggs at my health store is labeled fertililized eggs.And they arent leghorns.

Could be Rhode Island Reds.. don't they lay brown?

 

[kapie9969]

Ive read that fertile brown eggs come from many sources.My guess would be an production red hen and ive read they like to use white leghorn cocks for fertilizing.Look up sex links and you well learn a lot about other egg layers that are really good.Red stars and black stars are said to be as good as leghorns,leghorns are the best for the amount of feed to egg production.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I need more chickens and my birds aren't laying many now so I checked with Trader Joe's. The one in St. Louis doesn't carry fertile eggs. I called Whole Foods and they do. Only brown ones that come from their Chicago distributor.
I bought a dozen. They are Whole Foods 365 brand. The carton says they are cage free fertile raised naturally and eggs are gathered daily. The carton has a sell by Dec.18 stamp. All the fertile eggs in the store had the same sell by date.
There is no pack date or lay date but below the sell by date the stamp also says
9 WI-628 324
Other than that they might be from Wisconsin does anyone have info on what the numbers signify?
I set them at noon yesterday. That's 6 days after I set some of my own eggs. (I have a separate hatcher)
Wish me luck.

 

[Peep_Show]

The 324 means they were packed on the 324th day of the year. I think the other numbers and letters may be distributor-related.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Wow, thanks Peep.
That means they were at least 12 days old when I set them.

 

[Pele]

ahaha, I'm silly. One of the eggs I got rid of as a quitter is actually a Marans (doing a staggered hatch). So I have THREE out of four Whole Foods eggs working away on an embryo.

They're on day 12 and doing well! Even the egg with a small dent in it because of a thin shell. Crazy tough, these chickens.


edited to add: I also found a local organic grocery chain that carries fertile eggs! Crazy number of stores carrying these things in such a small city! We must have a strong hippy population or something.

 

[ellandeeranch]

I think mine are all losers from TJ, but I'm not sure. I candled at day 5 and today (day 7). No veins that I can see anywhere. I can see an air sac, and it looks like the top half is darker than the bottom. No red rings, and the dark stuff moves around as I candle. Nothing I see looks like any of the thousand candling videos I've watched on YouTube. I figure on waiting another week. No smell so far, so nothing lost.

I moved our NH rooster in with the two Red Stars that are laying well. He's already pestering them, to put it nicely. How long until any of those eggs might reasonably be considered fertile?

Richard in Neenach, California

 

[Pele]

I think mine are all losers from TJ, but I'm not sure. I candled at day 5 and today (day 7). No veins that I can see anywhere. I can see an air sac, and it looks like the top half is darker than the bottom. No red rings, and the dark stuff moves around as I candle. Nothing I see looks like any of the thousand candling videos I've watched on YouTube. I figure on waiting another week. No smell so far, so nothing lost.

I moved our NH rooster in with the two Red Stars that are laying well. He's already pestering them, to put it nicely. How long until any of those eggs might reasonably be considered fertile?

Richard in Neenach, California

Honestly, I rarely see veins. It takes seriously high lumen flashlights to get that, and I'm cheap/poor. If there is a dark mass that is really growing in there, and jigging about, that's your chick.

I've seen posts here on BYC about roos that fertilize hens at 14 weeks. Crack open the eggs and look for the white bullseye. That will tell you if he's being successful.