First time hatching. How many can I expect? Is there a market for my mixed breed extras?

[LovesteadMama]

So I've been chicken sitting for my neighbor and let me tell you, the eggs are certainly fertile. Those poor hens are going bald from the rooster. Anyways, I was wanting to increase my flock and felt it would be wise to get an incubator and hatch some of these fertile eggs. Well, I went ahead and just bought some chicks thinking it the cheaper option. 2 weeks later, my fiance came home with an incubator. Naturally, I'm hatching some eggs out. I'm not sure what kind of hatch rate to expect so I put twice the amount of eggs as I hope to get chicks from. Is that too many? And if I get a better hatch rate than I was expecting, is there a market for mixed breed chicks? I'm thinking not and that I'll just end up giving them away and most likely having the roosters for dinner . Thanks in advance for your advice!

 

[Northwest_Wannabe]

Depends on your area! and possibly the mixes. Bantams (even mixes) sell well due to them being cute n small (and spicy if you ask me!) and OE/EE mixes tend to do well too. Other mixes... you won't get rich off of them that's for sure, but you may be able to sell them for a few dollars! or if you sell them as older pullets you could make more money per bird.

We generally got a 95% hatch rate from all of our eggs, I think 75% was our lowest and it was with eggs we got from someone else, then travelled with them for an hour and a half before getting them home, so that may have impacted it. But it'll all depend on your incubator success/turning/fertility!

 

[LovesteadMama]

Depends on your area! and possibly the mixes. Bantams (even mixes) sell well due to them being cute n small (and spicy if you ask me!) and OE/EE mixes tend to do well too. Other mixes... you won't get rich off of them that's for sure, but you may be able to sell them for a few dollars! or if you sell them as older pullets you could make more money per bird.

We generally got a 95% hatch rate from all of our eggs, I think 75% was our lowest and it was with eggs we got from someone else, then travelled with them for an hour and a half before getting them home, so that may have impacted it. But it'll all depend on your incubator success/turning/fertility!

Thanks for the info! We have some few week old EE in our flock and I'm so excited about it! The incubator i have is farm innovators, circulated air with automatic egg turner. I'm keeping it at 99.5° and humidity is about 65% at the moment.

 

[CountingChickens]

Thanks for the info! We have some few week old EE in our flock and I'm so excited about it! The incubator i have is farm innovators, circulated air with automatic egg turner. I'm keeping it at 99.5° and humidity is about 65% at the moment.

Hi! How did this turn out? Did you have a lot of mixed breeds that hatched and if so, did they sell?