*UPDATE*.......... THE BABIES ARE HERE!!!

[Hezz]

I left 12 eggs out for my girls to hatch, and my GLW has been sitting on them for almost the entire time, but when she leaves the nest to eat and drink, I have another hen (an EE mix) that hops in and tries to steal them from her. LOL! She gets very upset, so what I did was divide the 12 between the two so they're each sitting on 6. Problem is, my EE mix will try to pull all of the other eggs over to her as soon as Lucy (my GLW) goes to eat or drink! I have been having to go out and take them from her and put them back under Lucy, otherwise she gets very upset.

My question is this, well I have a few actually, but I'll start with this one...... By me going out and moving them, am I doing them any harm? I try to be as gentle with them as possible.

Also, will they fight over the babies once they are hatched?

Do you count the day they actually laid them, and started sitting on them, as day 1 and then go from there? Or do you go to the next day and count that as day 1? I know these babies are going to be hatching on either the 18th, 19th, or 20th. But it depends on where you start counting, and that's what I'm not sure of. I had left 6 out there on May 29th, and then left another 6 the following day. So by my calculations it would be June 18th & 19th, or June 19th & 20th. LOL!

I know I'm confusing, but this is my first time actually letting my hens hatch them out.

Do the dates sound right to you guys/gals?

And last but certainly not least, kinda worried about this one.......Will my rooster try and hurt the babies once they hatch? Should I separate them? HELP!!!!!!

Thanks for any and all advice!

 

[brairgirl]

They may try to steal each others babies, but maybe not.

I don't think your harming them. Sometimes we have a hen that starts laying on the eggs in one box, then for whatever reason she wants to switch boxes. And wont lay on them otherwise. So we have to move the eggs to where she is.

The hatch dates will probably be the 19th and 20th.

None of our roosters have hurt the babies, sometimes they even try to feed them as the mothers do. But it probably depends on the rooster.

 

[Hezz]

Thanks for the response brairgirl. I'll be out there checking on them all day tomorrow, and Thursday. I do have a question though. Their nesting box is about 2 feet off the ground. Are they going to try to get out right away, or should I move them once they hatch? I also wanted to add pics of the girls together in the box. They are sharing the eggs, does that mean they are going to fight over the babies, or will they raise them together?

I also have 15 other hens, besides these two, and the rooster. Will the other hens try and "steal" the babies?

Here's the pics of the girls, and I had to add one of the proud papa! I have 6 EE eggs under them and 6 random brown eggs, who knows who's they are. LOL!

OH! I almost forgot......I did candling with them all tonight, 10 of them you can see no light, but 2 you can see the light, does that mean that those two are duds?

 

[brairgirl]

I don't think they will leave right away. Not sure if they will fight over them or not :/ The other hens probably won't try to steal the babies. Our other hens don't care, there will be the occasional peck on the head to the chick, but other than that they leave them alone. If those are the same eggs that have been under them the whole time, then they are probably duds.

 

[Hezz]

Ok, so the eggs have been there since May 29th & 30th, and I have been going out periodically all day today to see if anything is happening, and nothing......

Do you think they're going to hatch? I mean is there any special time, like night time, or during the day, that they usually start to hatch?

I am getting worried that all of this has been for naught, and the girls are going to be upset because there are no babies.

I feel kind of stupid, b/c this is my first time trying to let my hens hatch them out. I'm wondering if I've done something wrong.

How long should I leave these eggs under them before taking them away?

Does a solid egg, (like no light shining through), when candling mean that the babies are full grown in there? And what does it mean when they look like they're half full? I've never done it before, so I'm not sure what exactly to look for.

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated! I'm stressing out about this now.

 

[brairgirl]

They might be a couple days late, sometime you can put your ear to an egg and there will be tapping. And sometimes pips are hard to spot because its a little hairline crack.

I think you should leave them for a few more days, as long as they don't smell!

Usually a solid egg has a full grown baby in it, but sometimes they die when they are full grown. I have only had a couple like that though. But just give them a few more days.

 

[Metella]

Yes, and my friends us incubators and they routinely have an egg or so that is a day or two off count and hatches just fine.

I peeped at my eggs and when I heard a peep back - that was soooooo sweet.

Good luck.

 

[Orps]

I would give them a few more days and see what happens. As to the chicks. I put 7 silkie eggs under 3 oprington hens. They stole each others eggs the whole time they were incubating. Four chicks hatched. I thought the hens would fight over the chicks but they didn't. The group travel in a flock and all of them are protective of the chicks.

 

[Hezz]

Thank you all so much for responding. I was just out there again, and was candling to see if I could see anything any better in the dark. There are definitely 2 that I believe are "duds", but the rest just have like the air pocket at the one end.

I actually saw two of the babies move! One looked like a beak, and the other looked like a foot or something....

I am getting so excited now! Can't wait to see what hatches!

 

[Hezz]

So, on day 22 the first baby hatched...... Here some pics, I was actually fortunate enough to get a few as it was hatching out.












And I woke up this morning to find 4 more, so here's some pics of them.......





And now there are 7.... Still waiting for 3 more to hatch out. The two that I thought were duds, WERE actually duds, so we got rid of those. Anyway, here's a pic of all 7. When the others hatch out, I'll post a pic of all of them.