The Eggs are in The Bator!

Probably...ROFLMAO

Hahaha...this is fun, and I think you just made my day! Our rooster is not very discrete about it...but he mates with every hen...every day! I check each egg we crack open to eat and I would say that it is VERY rare that i find one that is not fertilized. There is no difference in taste, and most people would never know that it is fertile by looking at it.

Good. I wouldn't want to throw away good eggs needlessly!
Also so happy to make you laugh, I am laughing at myself
now, too. What was I thinking?

Hey dont worry about it...we have all been there. Just last week my mother showed me a picture of a couple women. I recognized everyone except one. I asked her who it was, and she thought I was drunk. yes...it was ME! It was taken last year when I looked a little different, and had borrowed a friends sweater.

Here is a question...does anyone else get wrinkly eggs? A couple of my hens started laying very wrinkled eggs as it started to get cold. I was thinking it could be the hens that take longer to lay...and maybe they are cooling down faster then they are being laid? Anywho...just thought I would check with you guys.

Eggs with wrinkles can be from if a hen has been
handled roughly, which I doubt in your case, laid
by an old hen, or if her ovary releases 2 yolks within
hours of one another, causing them to move thru the
ovaduct close together. The 2nd egg will have a thin
wrinkled shell that's flat toward the pointy end. If it bumps
against the first egg, the shell may crack and mend
back together before it is laid, causing a wrinkle.

Craziness! Yeah..my hens are living in the pent house. Maybe the rooster is being too rough. I know that our old lady (who is about 5) lays a lot of wrinkled ones, and one of our RIR who is still very young (less then 2) has been laying wrinkled ones. It only started with both of them when we got down to very cold temps, before that they both laid great eggs.

Hello fellow chicken and bird enthusiast I thought I was weird but now I feel at home when I read your posts! I curently have A bator full of eggs!! 51 total and 7 or 8 breeds with 10 or so of my own eggs from my own chicks that I raised with my 2 helpers witch are 2 & 4. We are having so much fun!! My eggs are due the 9th and we realy want some marans eggs to hatch, but I am having a hard time finding them available? Does any one know of any place in the mid-west that I might find some Black Copper Marans? Keep helping A chicken Freek feel normal! LOL

the incubator is ok i have not had it for long i have hatched 12 out and i have another lot in

i need help with my incubator tthere has been a smell getting worse and worse in my bator and then i seen a maggot on an egg i took it out and there were tonnes of them under it i candeled it and it was rotten any way how long will it take the smell to get out of the incubator

Is the incubator full of eggs? I had my son (2yrs old) find my incubator once when we had a sitter and he broke an egg in the bottom and I had to clean & disinfect it before the smell would go away. if you don't clean it the smell will only get worse, at least from my experience.

but it has about 20 eggs would the smell harm the development of the babies

Lucky, do you have a heating pad? If you do, you could put it on low, put a towel (doubled) on it, take the eggs out of the bator, place them on the towel, cover them with another towel, and clean the bator out and dry it then put the eggs back in it. I had a call for fertilized eggs last year, and that is how I kept them until the buyer picked them up. Out of 23 eggs they got, 19 hatched.

it is ok the smell is going away there are only 8 left i think my roo is getting a bit old but there are 12 girls for maybe he needs some back up?

Lucky, the only thing I would worry about the rest
of your incubating eggs is a high level of bacteria.
It would be a good idea to disinfect it well after
your hatch is done. Your roo may need some help.
Fertility is reduced with age.

Great pic, Free! Your boy looks like he is having the
time of his life. Is that his favorite chicken?
I saw some Maran eggs at Eggbid.com at a
reasonable asking price. I would like some Marans
myself.

The eggs are 'cooking' along in the store bought
bator. Temp is steady, added water, as after 4 days it
was low. Hubby is so tickled with me that I am as
excited as I am about being a new mommy. My
grandaughter saw the eggs for the first time this
weekend. She is just about 4 years, and doesn't
believe there are baby chicks in those eggs. :-)

Well, I experienced my first fatality this weekend.
I am not experienced at candling, and I read in Storey's
that if you see a vague yolk shadow after 4 or 5 days
that the emryo has died. This egg was looking different,
and the yolk looked like it floated around too freely.
I could not see any network of veins, either.
I decided to cull that one, to check out the contents.
When I cracked the egg onto a small plate, there was
a tiny question mark in the yolk, and--uh oh---
the heart was beating. Live and learn. I am grateful
for the learning experience, and I was able to share
the find with family, as they were visiting. It was really
fascinating, though. I have learned not to cull any
eggs til after at least the 7th day.

This is something that you cant really know for sure. We had one of ours do this same thing...but I gave it a few extra days just to make sure. As long as they dont get to the point of exploding it wont hurt to keep them in the bator for a few extra days just to make sure. Dont worry...if that egg was not as developed as the others, then there could have been other problems even if the embryo still had a heartbeart.

I just don't want any exploding eggs! I can't find anything
that says how long it might take for an egg to blow up.
tic tic tic tic BOOM LOL

Hahaha...I wouldnt worry about it. This is what I do:

On day 5 I candle my eggs. Any egg that looks 'odd' I keep to one corner of the bator. 2 days later I candle again...if any of them look to be growing, movement, veins etc...then I move them back. The ones that still dont look right I put into coffee filters. This might be weird..but I figure if something DOES happen then they are slightly contained. You could also put them into something else to contain them more as long as it is not glass, metal, or sealed. I give those another 2 days or so before deciding to get rid of them.

If they dont look right...then chances are that something isnt right.

If eggs are developing properly, does the yolk look like
it's expanding and getting bigger? I have noticed this
and a couple of them look like there might be veins
developing. I do not see the air sac yet, and this may
indicate it is too humid in there.

Yes. The yolks will start to expand as the chick developes. A good indication that the egg is 'bad' is when the yolk itself appears to swim in the egg...if it is no longer round it is probbably bad as well.

Here is a pic of an egg I just canded...day 10. The eye of the embryo is the lowest black dot, and the dark shadow that fills the egg except for the air sac (where the light is shining up). You can see the edge of the yolk at the top of the egg. At this stage the yolk takes up about half of the entire egg.

Thanks for the pic. The yolk in my eggs on day 5 is about
a third of the entire egg. As I suspected, it is too humid
in my bator. This explains why I can not yet see any air sac
in my eggs.
I wet a piece of gauze with luke warm water,
and placed this over the bulb part of the thermometer.
I checked it after allowing it to acclimate, an hour and a
half later, and the wet bulb reading was 92*. This translates
to about 75-76% humidity.
My wet bulb should read about 87*, which should give
me the right RH of 59-62%. Since the water evaporation
occurs over the surface of the water channel, which in this
bator runs along the bottom tray in a 'c' shape, I covered
about 20% of the area with a strip of foil, and taped it down.
I worked quickly to avoid letting the eggs cool much at all.
I re-applied the wet gauze to the bulb, and hopefully a lot
of humidity escaped while I did this. I will check it again
later this evening, hopefully this will improve conditions.

The bator comes equipped with two vent plugs on the top.
The instructions are to remove these at hatch time, or
as in my case, the humidity is too high. I removed one
to improve air circulation.

Sounds good. I found a humidity gauge thing (forgot what they are called) at Walmart for $2.50. It is not fance...but it does show 60, and then 75. So I can make sure it stays at 60, and then up to about 70 the last three days. Again...I didnt have any way to check the humidity for my first hatch. Odd that there is no air sac. Every egg that is layed by my chickens has a sac the day it is layed...I wonder if those quail eggs work different.

These are the chicken eggs. It is funny I can't see that-
I have been tilting them kind of to the side when I
candled them. I will look again on Wednesday, maybe I
should always keep them big end up and not tilt- could
be just 'user error'. I never let them be small end up.

Well let us know how it goes. I guess I wouldn't be too concerned as long as they are growing.

Here is an egg at 5 days. Definately growing, and I
believe the dark spot near the right edge of the shadow
is the eye..sorry for the blur, I am closeup challenged...

This message was edited Feb 4, 2008 7:45 PM

Here's a pic of the gentleman "Davey" very good bird...

Egg looks good. If you were to put the light in from the side with the air sac...if the egg has one...then you should be able to see the embryo better. It also helps to hold the egg as it is in the bator, on its side if possible. That will put the embryo closest to the top of the egg shell, and easiest to see. Good work! And good looking man!

I still am not getting my RH down to where I like it.
The egg cell should be visible, and available to them
when they pip. When chicks get ready to pip, a muscle
in their necks contracts, causing the head to arch up
and back thus tearing a hole with their egg tooth in the
air cell. It's at that moment they get their first breath, and
are able to chirp or 'pip', using this air til they make the
first hole in the egg shell. The chickens are due to pip
in 15 days, and the quail in just 12.

Inside the bator, the aluminum ring in the lid is the heating
element, and the disk is the wafer thermomstat. 2 windows
for viewing..

This message was edited Feb 5, 2008 9:00 AM

This is the Mama hen, Blanca, on a stroll with her beau..

Looking back over the thread, I realized that last year we got our chicks in April. So....guess I will be plugging up the bator mid-March.

Truest, is that a "Hoverbator"? That is the kind I bought last year. I am like you, not handy enough to build things so I have to buy. But, that's alright, someone has to keep these companies in business. :-)

Yes, my new gadget is a hovabator. I went middle of the
road on cost. I think the still air was 47.00, and the 'plug
and play' that was preset to hatching temp was 115.00.
This one is forced air, keeping a more moderate, circulated
air temp, for 74.00. It was very easy to set the temp, and
it maintains it's temp perfect, so I didn't see the need
to spend the extra. I did opt to get the auto turner for
47.00, as the quail need to be turned more often than
the chicken eggs, and we are sometimes gone from home
for extended periods.

After adding more foil to cover about half the water
channel, I have managed to get my humidity down to
about 62%. The instructions say to add water to channel
#2 for hatching, so that both channels have water, but this
for me is a question, as I had above the recommended
hatching RH with just the one filled, and 72% RH is way
too high for incubation.

I don't remember what I paid for mine, but the total was over 100.00. Of course that included shipping. I will have to look and see which one I got. I think it was the middle priced one also.

One thing I am learning from this forum is that I will be disinfecting mine before and after I use it. That way I will be pretty certain I will not have any problems with infections. As far as the RH goes, that will have to be trial and error as your is turning out to be. I hope to be as successful as you guys with mine. Although it is almost as cheap to buy as it is to hatch. Especially with some hatcheries not requiring one to buy way too many chicks as we need. LOL.

Thanks, Granny, but I won't feel the success until I
actually have fluffy chicks in there!LOL
I suppose the cost savings comes in after you have used
the incubator over a period of time. I think other benefits
are you don't have to wait for the hatchery season, and
you can share the learning experience with the kids. Also,
if you find you have a superb bird that isn't particularly
broody, you can hatch for them. Putting my hen eggs in
was just an afterthought, or learning experience for me.
Blanca's eggs are white, and I can candle them more easily
and see the progress, so this helps me a lot.
Since I want the quail as a meat bird, and they are not
dependable brooders, I chose this route. Also, since
my goal is to raise mountain quail, and they're so expensive
to buy mating pairs, I will need to go with the eggs, instead.

Sounds like you have a good plan there! Maybe we should start looking for some rare birds that we can hatch and raise...that would be fun! This way you can raise your quail..and then keep pulling eggs from them to incubate on your own. I must admit that incubating them (despite the cost and work) is still 100 times more exciting then just ordering some, or going to the store and picking some up.

My next batch is due to hatch on the 15th. :) so far all 10 are doing great. I am very excited to see what my OEGH chicks come out like!

Well, something about going to the store and picking them up. There is no place around here that does that anymore. I guess the rumor about bird flu stopped most of the elevators and Tractor Supply from getting live chicks. I asked and they told me at TC they would never have live poultry again. I could order chicks from them, but had to order 25 or more, and they would have them delivered to their store. It is 35 miles away from me, so that left me checking at the elevator.

The elevator told me the same, so I might as well order from the hatchery myself. Same difference, only having to go at least 20 miles to pick them up instead of going 4 miles to the post office.

But yes, it will be interesting to see if I can hatch my own and like you say, I don't have to worry about what time of year to hatch them.

Of course if I was wanting to get show chicks, I would HAVE to order from the hatchery, which I might do in the future.

I think picking them up from the hatchery is always
better than the poor things going thru the post office.
I don't have one nearby. There is Ideal, in Cameron Tx
but will have to look that one up to see how far it is.

I very much want to raise Mountain Quail. The Coturnix
are supposed to be easy, the mountain not. I want to
know I can raise the coturnix very healthy first, then try
the more difficult- more expensive mountain. They are
a beautiful bird, and don't require a lot of space, not to
mention 6 hatching eggs are $40-$45. I generally do
very well with birds. I am a stickler for good nutrition and
a good environment., plus I am attentive to creature
comforts for all my animals.

I recandled the eggs in an upright hole as you suggested,
Mel. I made a new candling box, and used a maglight.
I was able to see them much better than the previous
oval and laying down position. Looks like all but one are good-
one looks like it may have a blood ring, indicating embryo
death. I will wait a couple more days to be sure.
The other 6 look as if there is vein webbing, and
one of those I could see the heartbeat and it moving!
Wow! They move around a lot! I may actually get some
of my first try, to hatch. I am hoping there are more like
Davey than Blanca. She is such a good layer, though.
This is sooooo cooool. I have to agree, Mel, hatching is
way more fun than the post office. But, please, don't tell my
little guys that I have ordered, ok? I want them to know
they are just as 'special'. LOL

Oh My Gosh- It just dawned on me that my little
McMurray chickies will be here in 6 days!