Oh Yeah, I'm going to candle them tonight then. They are 6 days in today. I want to see if I can see anything.
I got an incubator this weekend!
Oh how much fun you are going to have doing that. Cant wait for a post to what you find.
I candled, and didnt see too much. Most of my eggs are dark brown or green. Majority I could only see a dark shadow on half the egg, the part that was down (I think). The two lightest eggs I have I could see a small dark spot that was actually moving! Could not see blood vessels, not even on the lighter two eggs. Last egg I candles didnt see anything in this one, so I'm guessing this one was not fertile, but I want to give it a few more days just in case before throwing it out. Does all this sound normal for what one would see with the color of the eggs I have? Thanks!
the shadow at the bottom is the yolk, if ever it looks scrambled toss the egg quickly!
those vessels and moving things are great news, give the others more time, esp with dark shells, easy to miss...
tf
I'm hoping the others are ok considering I could only clearly tell 2 out of 15. How would I know what scrambled looked like? This just looks like a shadow across half the egg. Cannot see any darker spots within, no bloodvessels. Very had to see. More difficult than I expected. I have some fertile eggs to someone who contacted me on craigslist. He was supposed to let me know how all hatched out. I will have to email him again. He's prob. avoiding since he had offered me some chicks in exchange. I just want to know if m eggs hatched for him! With having dark eggs and not being able to see very well, I'm worried about an rotton explosive egg gone endetected.
yes dark sheeled eggs are very hard to candle and u mis things easy as tamara said i learnt that the hard way and i can usualy smell somthings wrong before i see it so it might be the same fo u
josh
right, trust your nose to tell you when it is time to candle again and throw out the bad one...
for dark eggs, the cool-lite candler is the best. ranges in price from 12-16 dollars plus shipping, and so far everyone i have convinced to buy one has thanked me!
tf
i use one of those as well but most of the time i use my lamp/egg candler light that i converted using a toilet role
Thank you, tf:0)
you are always welcome. i showed off Rocky and I mean ROCKETTE and Pecky to some folks today. their son wants to get into birds [chickens] and sell eggs. after everything they finally admitted that they already had three small 3 week old RIRs.... he is gonna study, esp online and some books, and decide what he wants. i think they were surprised there are so many chickens to choose from, all with their own uses...
it will tak u a while to get used to calling her rockette wont it tamara
duh... maybe there is another name for her? and i just don't know it yet...
she will tell you if she wants a new one wont she
Well her name WAS Cheddar. Her sister Colby is my laying hen right now....Colby is getting really good at Groucho Marx impersonations---she runs everywhere in a crouch.
lol
Cheddar? i will give that a try tomorrow... Pecky and Cheddar, Cheddar and Pecky i have started calling Floppy Pecky by mistake, cause i intervene if a hen starts to peck at him "Leave Pecky alone, err i mean stop pecking on Floppy!"
so glad they don't ALL have names...
if all chickens had names i would go crazy
im already there... come and join me...
sur my not just wait a sec..................................aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaabb
This message was edited Jul 10, 2008 2:57 PM
OK, goofball, now go back, click edit, and put a space or hard return in that so it doesn't mess up the screen for everyone...
how do i edit i know i am a genius
ther that wasnt to bad for a crazy person sorry bout that every one
see now you are a crazy genius with good self control LOL
No, TF, he is a chickeny genius!! Just like me.
GG
yeh me and GG are chickeny genius's wana join tf :)
I candled again tonight (can someone say addiction and intervention!). I'm getting better at it, or else that extra day helped! I had 15 eggs in, saw viability in all brown eggs and pretty sure all green eggs looked good as well. Had 2 eggs that appeared to have nothing in them except the yolk, no darkness at all, so I chucked those. Down to 13 now and feeling confident all is developing well. So today I was thinking of how I have my eggs in the bator. They are laying down on there sides. I have an x and an o on opposite sides in the middle of the egg for turning. I was thinking that when you store the eggs while getting ready for the bator, they are kept in the egg carton, pointy side down rotated at 45 degrees. I am more or less just turing mine in a circle while they lay flat. Is that the way its supposed to be?
Do you mean spinning them like in spin the bottle? That would be bad. But if you mean rolling them 180 like roll out the barrel. That would be right:0)
some people roll them different ways i have never had to turn any of mine because it is automatic
We roll ours the 180 too, three times a day and it works.
Christy
ROLL, NOT SPIN!
Yes, roll gently.
Yes, its been like rolling a barrel, so good, I'm releived. Thought maybe I had been doing it wrong.
wat about if u fliped it would it fix it
Today is day 14 in the incubator! I candled last night. There are 13 eggs at this point in the bator. All look viable except for one. Most of the eggs are difficult due to dark brown shells or green shells. A couple are light brown and those are great to see! I have a couple with VERY active babies inside. These guys are like a whirlwind of activity. Most of the others I stand there squinting, my eyeball an inch from the egg, looking for movement! Is that typical? Can you point me to a link or website that would show good pics of candling at different maturity levels. Just want to make sure everyone is ok in the shells. Thanks : )
There is a great little book called Guide to Better Hatching that answers a lot of questions. It is available from poultry supply companies and I think costs about $8. The company we buy from is www.cutlersupply.com.
yes, i LOVE that book!
and yes, you are just catching some while they are active, others while they are sleeping... imagine having that many in your womb LOL... never sleeping at the same time...
tf
congrats
so your hatch is getting closer and closer
Bad News, we had a power outage last night from 12:30am to about 6:30am this morning. I happen to have a battery back up that I use on my fish tank, so I was able to hook that up. The temp was fairly inconistent during this time frame. By the time I got the battery hookup set up to the bator it had dropped to 90 for a short time. That should not be much of an issue. The battery back up beeps loudly while it is going. I knew I had about 2 hours on it. I woke up at 4am because the beeping had stopped. Bator was back down to 90 degrees. I'm guessing it was at this temp for about an hour. I called my mother. Poor thing, she thought something bad had happened for me to be calling her! Well, to me, it was bad! I wrapped the eggs in towells, put them in a bowl, cranked the heat in my car and loaded the bator and eggs in the car and drove them to my mothers. Got them hooked up, they dropped to temp in the 80's during this time frame, about 30min to an hour before I got the bator to the right temp. I went home after and went back around noon to turn the eggs and bator was at 104. Adjusted it again and am getting ready to head back down there to turn again in a bit. I want to bring it home, but I dont want to drop their temps again. Any chances of still getting my babies out of this. What rotten luck, so close to hatch........ : (
I think there is a good chance--how far along were they? I think everyone has had the temp go up to at least 104 briefly and everything turn out well--and they say that higher temps are more dangerous than low. Let us know what happens.
The eggs are 16 days in the incubator today. I did go and pick them up and my mothers and bring them home. I kept them wrapped in towells with a rice sock. They are now back in the incubator with temp at 96 and climbing. Keep your fingers crossed for my babies! Talk about stress! We have another thunderstorm brewing, hope we dont lose the power AGAIN!