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

[Cotton42]

After finding this page. I searched TJ and found no fertile eggs there but I did at WF. I bought a dozen at Whole foods last week. They were light brown eggs. the date was marked so they were a week old or rather packed a week before I bought them. When I brought them home I candled them, a few had bad air cells (I never saw what that looked like before. but now know what everyone is talking about with this). I weighed them all let them set overnight. numbered and marked on the egg what they looked like porous, broken cell, or good. and charted it. I set them on Feb 14th. I candled tonight and looks like nothing so far. I don't even see the air cell. I put quail eggs in 2 days before this and I see air cell and veins. So I don't think I'm going to get anything from these eggs. I'll candle them again when I take the quail eggs out for hatching next week. These quail only take 17 days to hatch. So I know they develop faster then the chicks but I would have thougth I would have seen at least a air cell by now. I'm doing dry incubation so I know my humidity isn't to high. I do see dark blobs which I think is the yolk, a couple of these blobs moved when I turned the eggs, and they were in the eggs that I had marked as good eggs. sigh. I guess I'll know more next week but it doesn't look promising so far.

Not one single person on this thread has gotten Whole Foods eggs to hatch or even vein. I highly doubt they are fertile, so don't feel bad.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Not one single person on this thread has gotten Whole Foods eggs to hatch or even vein. I highly doubt they are fertile, so don't feel bad.

Thanks for that information. I wondered but didn't want to read the whole thing. I may open one at the store and show the manager that they're not fertile.

 

[ozexpat]

I'm pretty sure the reason why fertile eggs are so prevalent in southern California is because of the Latino population. I remember reading somewhere that there is preference in Latino cultures for fertile eggs over infertile eggs. I could be totally wrong though.

i can guarantee that you wont find premium fertilized eggs in any latino market in california.

why do californians like fertile eggs?

they dont - well most of them dont - they dont even know about the difference. but those who think they do, probably feel that the fertilized egg is much more likely to be cage free, maybe hoping its free range.

god bless them. they sustain a market that gives us something to play with and lots to speculate about

 

[Pele]

Not one single person on this thread has gotten Whole Foods eggs to hatch or even vein. I highly doubt they are fertile, so don't feel bad.

Um... I don't count as a person then? I've been posting for weeks about the WF eggs that hatched 4 babies for me. And another poster got a similar hatch right at the same time (ckaywood I believe). Not sure what you have against WF, but they DO sell fertile eggs, and they DO hatch.

 

[Cotton42]

Um... I don't count as a person then? I've been posting for weeks about the WF eggs that hatched 4 babies for me. And another poster got a similar hatch right at the same time (ckaywood I believe). Not sure what you have against WF, but they DO sell fertile eggs, and they DO hatch.

You hatched Whole Food eggs?! Wow, what kind of chickens did you get? I would love to see pictures. I must not have been paying attention, sorry!

 

[Pele]

Whole Foods gets their eggs from Rock Island Hatchery in Sonoma, which has two varieties of birds: RIRs and Leghorns. I believe the chicks are the product of Leghorn roos over RIR females (they were brown).

 

[oldrooster]

I don't want to see a fight break out here but it could easily be that at some farms they may have more roosters than others or perhaps the farms sell eggs from certain hens whom are somehow segregated from the roosters and also a few eggs from the ones they wish to raise the offspring of if they have more than they want or need for their breeding programs need and they label all of them as fertile eggs or perhaps none of them as fertile and there are some on here whom where lucky enough to get a handful of fertile eggs that was shipped to stores....

 

[kcaywood]

Count me one of the lucky ones. This is my follow up to an earlier post of my Rock Island babies. They are now three weeks old. Eleven of my eggs (out of a dozen) developed to hatch, but only four pipped. I ended up with two pullets and two cockerels. They are all white, but one pullet has a single dark gray feather on her back. I must say, these are the tamest chicks I've raised, out of many breeds.
From my post in the "Whole Foods Brand X" Forum:

This was last weekend - one roo was definitely alpha, and was "starting stuff" all the time Now I've given both roos to our local feed store, where they sell them ... and the two girls are so mellow and sweet.

 

[ellandeeranch]

Wondering how long to wait until I send the TJ's cockerels to the freezer farm? I'm ready to process them, but they're only 7 weeks. Sounds like 12-14 weeks is what most posters do. Leghorns don't get any bigger after that (if I read correctly), so you're wasting feed at that point.

I read about a few people who processed earlier, even at 7-9 weeks, for little fryer chickens.

I'm hoping to keep a couple of the hens, but they're so flighty and nervous, I don't know how well they'll integrate into the mixed flock I have. I'm sure not putting them in with the New Hampshire coop. That's a nice mellow flock that spend all sorts of time tripping me as I feed them every day!

My mixed flock has NH, Easter Egger, and Cuckoo Maran. I plan on adding those Leghorn hens in a couple months after they grow out.

Anyone know if you can buy Chicken Atavan at the feed stores? LOL.

Richard in Neenach, California

 

[Pele]

I don't want to see a fight break out here but it could easily be that at some farms they may have more roosters than others or perhaps the farms sell eggs from certain hens whom are somehow segregated from the roosters and also a few eggs from the ones they wish to raise the offspring of if they have more than they want or need for their breeding programs need and they label all of them as fertile eggs or perhaps none of them as fertile and there are some on here whom where lucky enough to get a handful of fertile eggs that was shipped to stores....

I was worried about the same thing myself, which is why I scoped out our Whole Foods for weeks before I bought the pack I intended to incubate. I think I ended up buying 4 seperate packs of eggs on 4 seperate occassions, then opened most of the eggs inside to confirm fertility. One pack had 3 eggs that weren't fertile, and another had 1 infertile egg.

I think it is worth noting, however, that I have heard that Rock Island eggs has been sued for false advertising in the past year or so. It IS possible that they've corrected some bad behaviors they were practicing earlier.