Who is with me?

[countrybum]

Quote:
I knew you could do it.

I am sure Puzzle will turn out to be a tough little booger, just hope the name does not turn into Fryer.

Riqui, sorry to hear about the little guy. I was hoping I was wrong and he would pull through.

 

[walkswithdog]

Puzzle would have to go a long way to get to fryer, lol most of them have to piss me off to end up with a food name. And Rocks really don't get to eating size for quite awhile.

Tell you what though the Barred/PR mixes are actually a LOT bigger, and so are the PR/BA ones. Though the BA is smaller than my PRs and the PR's not big for their breed. The PR/BA's are running almost neck and neck with turkeys the same age. I'm impressed. I butchered one the other day for pissing me off, he came in just about 2.5 lbs, he was the smallest of the group of roos. Really for two people not a bad sized bird and tasty. Now the bigger ones are looking more ... annoying LOL.

I'm going to be shifting focus to Delawares and selling most of the turkeys off, and almost all the rocks. I'll keep a few Rocks but it's Delawares I find more hardy, certainly larger, they're death on lots of small nuisances like mice, lizards, scorpions, small snakes. I'm going to have to take feed bills wayyy down to accomodate the new dental bills. So far fewer turkeys, far fewer chickens and switch emphasis until finances improve.

 

[riqui1]

WWD, how is Puzzle doing this morning? Still holding strong and getting around well?

My next batch of silkies and my araucanas should be in the mail today. I didn't realize how "hard" the araucanas were to hatch until I started doing a bit of research and the woman that I am buying them from told me. That is interesting that their hatch rate is so low and their mortality rate is so high after hatch. She is going to be mixing some ameracaunas in with them, so hopefully that will help some!

I now wish that I had never put a digital thermometer in with my eggs!! My husband had one that he used to read the indoor and outdoor temperature, so I put that in the incubator with the little sensor and the constant shifts in temp are making me crazy!! If the thermometer is sitting ON TOP OF the eggs, then it should read about 102, right? It did, last night, but now it is down into the high 90s. I am sure it is because of the drop in temperature in the house overnight, but my word...these stupid incubators should regulate themselves a little better, shouldn't they?!

I hope everyone is having a good start to their week!!

 

[chickie_mama]

my word...these stupid incubators should regulate themselves a little better, shouldn't they?!

I don't know why I found that as funny as I did.... But man, that was my laugh for the morning!!!!!!!​

 

[walkswithdog]

riqui do you have one with a probe in a water wiggler? That's the one that counts. A bator can swing 6 or 7 degrees of air temp and hardly affect the actual egg temp at all. You need the reassurance of a water wiggler and it's own thermometer. Makes it a ton easier on the mind.

Puzzle is alive and well and eating and drinking and should join his mother and sibs tonight after one more day getting stronger. Looks like he's one crush case that made it.

The Sizzles etc are due to hatch here very shortly, so getting the baby out of the bator is going to be a thing.

Because all the silkies and sizzles had totally unstable air cells I did incubate them in a carton and often I'd leave it air cell up for a majority of the day or night. That seems to have set and stabilized the cells, some have odd shapes but are not nearly as bad as they were and are stable now. - go babies go -

After that I'm done. Work on the Goliath bator will keep me busy. Now that I have to have a ton more and more expensive dental work, I won't be getting eggs again or setting my own til Fall. I have to save on eggs and feed and organize. I'm selling down to bare bones and sorting hard. After the dentist is paid I'll go back to breeding for real. Spit happens...

 

[riqui1]

I have yet to put another playdough egg in (I have yet to find a water wiggler), as I was waiting to see how much room I was going to have after the other 2 dozen+ eggs arrived on Wednesday. I guess that I will just go ahead and do it, to keep myself from going crazy and wanting to constantly play with that little dial on the bator!! It just didn't seem as if the medical thermometer that I used in that manner last time was very reliable. I would check the temp of the playdough egg with my digital every once in a while and they were never the same, with the dig always being lower! I guess that I need to research a manner in which I can test the correctness of all of my thermometers and go from there...

Chickie_mama: It is okay that you laughed at that comment. I knew, when I wrote it, that it was essentially a joke. lol

WWD: That is great that you are going to be able to put Puzzle out with his mother. What a happy ending that would be!

What is a sizzle? Good luck with those and the silkies! I hope that they hatch well for you!

I don't know if I should have done this or not, but before I put my eggs in this time, I tipped my bator just a tiny little bit, so that I could lay the eggs in their with the large end up. Do you think that will help at all? It is such a tiny little tilt that they probably won't even notice, but I was hoping...

Good luck with the finances, WWD! I can definitely feel your pain there! I think that I am going to be accruing some serious medical bills here soon, on top of a million other things! I was supposed to have medical coverage again starting the first of July, but it seems that paperwork has gotten messed up somewhere... You're right - spit happens...but why does it have to happen at the most inconvenient times and right along with a bunch of other "spitty" things?!

 

[walkswithdog]

No don't use a medical thermometer all the time. Just use the putty or wiggler with a probe digital thermometer in it. You just check for the actual difference between a medical thermometer and the digital so you'll know how much to add or subtract from the digital reading. My digital is one degree off, so when I glance at the readout I subtract one degree from the reading and KNOW the accurate reading in the "egg".

Right now it says 100.9 so the temp is actually 99.9. Now I know the egg temp and I won't worry that the air temp in there is 97 at the moment.

Stuff the probe in the putty egg or make a wiggler from a pair of ziplock baggies. Water in the inside one, another to prevent spills. Seal it, roll it up, tape it as a roll, stuff a digital thermometer probe in it and you're off.

After 4-6 hours of getting to bator temp stuff a medical thermometer in it to check accuracy, write down the difference, add or subtract that when checking the temp on the digital. Easy.

I'd go nuts fiddling with a medical one day in and out - too hard to read.

 

[riqui1]

See...I thought of that...trying to read the medical thermometer while it was in the incubator. I found one for blind people like me. It is huge, with huge numbers on it. I can actually read it through my incubator window with accuracy. You are right though - it would be much nicer to just look at that digital display and see it. I will have to change that up. I had put the digital one in the incubator, after calibrating it, for the humidity level though. I guess that it means that I will just have to go down and get another one for that, as the little one that I used for the last hatch was WAY off, according to what I have going on now.

What about one of those digital thermometers? Do you think that one of those could be left in the incubator without damaging it? I have three of those buggers (as I just buy a new one whenever I can't find one) and had considered the idea of putting one of those in the putty egg. I would just have to turn it on and check it every time I rolled the eggs. Huh...something to think about and maybe even try, since I have extras.

OH NO! Frizzles are cute!! They look like someone took a blow dryer to them and shot all of their feathers backwards!! This is not a good thing... I am going to go do laundry again!!

 

[countrybum]

Quote:

That is as good as shoot happens.

Riqui, I do not allow (but I have peafowl eggs also) my temp to go over 101 on top the eggs. I try (and I mean TRY) to keep the temp between 99.5 and 100.5 on top the eggs. This morning mine was at 102 and I opened and added cool water. I did not adjust the temp gage due to the fact I assumed it was the room temp heating that caused the slight spike. Adjust your temp causes more problems, especially when you know you had it set already.

 

[countrybum]

Now for my scam story.

Part 1

I took my horse, a gorgeous ApHA Grulla mare, to be trained August of 2008. Upon taking the horse there she had 30 days of trainig and had just started her riding. The people where going to finish her training were to ride her 5 days a week 1 hour a day.

This sounds great right.

Well, upon taking her to the rider, her knee was swollen from the other trainer and she had a hematoma under her leg. The new rider was worried, so I took the horse to my Equine Vet that stated the knee should not be a problem and the swelling will go down. He did not see a problem because she was not limping or flinching when pressure was applied.

So I took her back to the stable and told them the Vet said she is fine and it is okay to train her, but to flush the knee with cold water 1 or 2 times a day.

$300 for the first month.

Part 2 second month coming shortly.