Hey all, thanks for the answers, I will try to remember them asll..........
anyway some added details, my birds get good food not a skinny chicken in my yard, they are wormed regularly, and given 22 % protein feed, with scratch, that is 1/2 boss, in the am, they get all the veggies they can eat, left over kitchen scrap, and free range all day year round......... I have had chickens 3 years I have never lost a chicken to a sickness, or disease, I lost 1 young one from Jim who just showed up dead one morning and 1 girl from Jim also, same thing seemed fine at feeding time, ate, layed her egg, by noon she was dead, I think my rooster somehow broke her neck.
The only thing my chickens have ever had is mites last spring, and I haven't seem 1 since I went too sand in my coop last year....... No one seems sick or out of the ordinary, no runny stools, no, sneezy, wheezy, or coughing chickens............ I have not done anything differently in the whole 3 years i have had my chickens..........
Egg selection is done by feel and sight, only perfect looking, feeling eggs are chosen for hatching, clean eggs not washed or refrigerated eggs either, I have never bought eggs to hatch all my eggs are from my chickens. collected several times a day until I have 22/ 24 depending on size and what I think will fit in the incubator........ like Daphne's eggs will take up much more room than my EE's eggs, because she lays a extra large Jumbo egg......... anyway they never take more than 2 days to fill the incubator, they are set in a carton, right side up, at an angle, and rotated 2txs a day to keep them vital, they are not cooled but kept fresh, on the cool end of the kitchen counter, out of the sun or light....probablyy around 65 degrees there.. I also choose the biggest eggs for chick size instead of small eggs or for color if they are my EE's I only set Blue /Blue eggs........no greens or pinkish eggs were set.......... My ee's must be my best chickens because that is the hatch that did the best my second hatch. My first hatch had so many clears because my Del rooster was loose with 29 hens, until I separated for breeding, I should have waited a week or two before collecting eggs from that pen, but I was already running late because my
brinsea was on back order and a month late in coming... so I set eggs 2 days after separating my breeding pens..
I may have been at fault for the baby with the guts hanging out, but not sure exactly how?? he was pipped and zipped and sat in that egg 2 days after my 21 st day, and he should have been ready to hatch on his own.... 1 other baby died in its shell pipped and zipped the same way and he died because I left him alone, the membrane was dried over his face........ why were the guts out anyway, is that a normal thing before hatch for the intestines to be outside the body cavity? I thought the only thing on the outside was the yolk sack.......?
and if all the eggs were set the same day how could 1 chick not be ready to hatch? all the others including the fully formed no pipped eggs looked the same size and stage at death, and the only thing outside the body was the undigested yolk sack........ so I'm really confused now.....
Now 1 more thing to ponder............. I cleaned and reset my bator today, 1/2 filled 1 chamber and let it come too temp, which now without eggs in it, is 99 degrees, when i removed the babies it was still at 101.......... why is it less now? it has been running since 830 am....and why would it spike in the last 2 days of incubation???????
Bigz does your incubator have digital controls? mine is the eco model no controls just a turner to adjust temp, and a regular thermometer inside the bator....?? I could not afford the fancy model, with all the extra's.......... so anyway I plan to set 1 more batch, I have a dozen good eggs from today, and will collect the rest tomorrow, any pointers on anything I may have did wrong??????? ....Kim
