MAY 2016 "Land of the Free Because of the brave!" Hatch-a-Long Hosted by, Mike & Sally

[Chaos18]

Haven't had a chance to read through any of the previous posts yet this morning...

Hoping my runner duck and royal palm turkey eggs are punctual and hatch tomorrow while I am away at my graduation. No signs of anything yet.
Then towards the end of next week I should have a bunch of chicken eggs hatching.

Time to start thinking about what I want to get for eggs to hatch in June because you know I haven't hatched enough already this spring LOL

Congrats on graduating. Hopefully you come home to a bator full of babies.

 

[Scovy Momma]

If it'll make you feel better than go ahead.

Awws, thanks. I guess I was exaggerating more than anything. I've loved these little birds since I first saw @Ra_ post pictures. I just feel bad that they aren't cooperating.

 

[weegarden]

Update: I set 10 eggs, and was waiting for my special silkie to hatch! It finally hatched!!!!

And I am in love!

It doesn't look at all like I thought. The mom is best of show blue, and just beautiful!!!! The dad is actually a white silkie that when mixed with my splash, has produced a beautiful blue silkie baby, so I assumed that it was either black or blue underneath. BUT, this baby is actually chipmunk colored! It will be very interesting to see how it grows up. Would love to know where the chipmunk came from. It is an absolute fluff ball!!!! Anyway, I am thrilled to finally have a baby from her. She is older, and I have not gotten a fertile egg from her in over 2 1/2 years!!!! So, this one is very special!

Hatch progress: 1 gorgeous silkie, and 4 rocks. 2 blue silkies from my other parents still in the bator internally pipped. And, I had 1 silkie and 2 rocks die after lockdown.

I'm not sure why I am losing babies after lockdown. There seem to be a couple each time. I did notice that my temp dropped right after I added water at lockdown (added nice warm water.) Would that have killed them? It did drop to around 95 for what seemed like overnight, but I wouldn't think that would kill them.

Eggtopsy: no internal pips on any of the three. Membranes seemed fine. Yolk sac almost completely absorbed on one, and more yolk sac showing on the others. The silkie did have a vaulted skull. Everything looked fine otherwise.

I did accidentally pull a chunk of shell off of one that is still alive,

but luckily felt it move immediately (I always go in slowly, just in case) Grabbed a chunk of shell from another egg, and put it on, to cover the hole after moistening the membrane, and put it back in the incubator. So patiently waiting for those last two to hatch.

 

[BullChick]

 

[BantyChooks]

Welp, I'm a little bummed. It's been 11 days cooking & my Tribbles don't seem to be Tribbling. They're mostly clear & 2 are sloshing around. I kinda wanna cry a little.

Oh noooo!! And so expensive too!

 

[butterfliesdoku]

External pip on the egg my broody is over! I'm off to work so I'll check for a chick poking out from between her feathers later :

 

[Sally Sunshine]

Sally, I think that...I want from CH was meaning, he wants..those beautiful eggs!

I know but he cant have them the poor thing. plus he already had some lol

Tonight is the due date and I have a pip!

sweettttttttttttttttttttttt

OMG Sally just saw your post of all the eggs you have "In Process" I would be a wreck! This hatching biz is stressful LOL broody hens are the way to go sheesh.......THen again you would have to have a huge "shmangle" of broodys to handle that many

LOL I hate broodies, dont trust them!

I know there are a lot of people hatching ducks (Yippie); I too have 24 more due in 3 weeks. BUT, I have a question about a 10 day duckling I was hoping someone who had ducks could help me. (I thought this might be good to try here in case anyone else has seen this; I did post in The Duck Thread too).

I have an actual UGLY DUCKLING. (the one on the left)
This duckling is 10 days old. She is the one that had the cord wrapped around her tightly when she hatched. Were the cord was there were no "feathers". And now, 10 days later, she REALLY has no feathers/down/fuzz/covering. She is almost bald below her neck. I am keeping her warm and she doesn't go swimming. She is a little "wet" in these photos because she is still a duck and acts like a duck; she managed to sneak past us. She is eating and drinking normal. The other duckling ars not picking on her; they are actually all very docile and bonded.

Is this normal? Has anyone seen this with other ducks. The other ducks have thick fluff and are not losing it or looking this turkey like when wet.. We are going to wait and see if she eventually feathers out like normal during the next 6 weeks. I just wanted to see if there was anything special I could do for her. Any thoughts?

awwwww the poor thing! make a sock sweater????

I have a baby turkey

CONGRATS!!!!

 

[Sally Sunshine]

Quote: Our sharpies seem to grow legs and walk away all the time...

So I went out and bought 3 new multi color packages of Sharpies "just" for marking eggs. I had the primary marker colors Black, blue, red and green. But I've been using colored zip ties to mark each hatch different, so I bought markers that matched the zip ties. But now I have markers that don't have zip ties to match all the colors in the markers...lol. So I'm looking for colored zip ties that match the new markers...lol.

What is everybody's best way of marking chickens to keep track of individual birds within a hatch, yet keep track of that hatch as well?? Something with numbers and different colors or something that one can write numbers/letters in different colors??

I'm really missing the way I was able to use to keep track of my sheep. Because they were registered purebreds, they had to be double tagged with tags that had your farm letters, the number and the letter of the year. But I wasn't going to catch each animal just to look at the tag and match it to records...so I used the father's color for the back of the tag, the mother's color for the front and all my numbers started with the number of that year. 2004 animals were numbered 401-499. (Who can remember the letter of the year 5 years back...not me...lol) I could see at a glance which line was the offspring was from and know the year instantly.

I'm looking at different leg bands...not interested in wing bands that puncture. Was thinking of wide plain elastic that could fit over the wing and fit nice at the base of the wing....information could be written on the band. Haven't found what I'm thinking of yet...

@ChickenCanoe

Paddler has a great system.

LEG BANDS ideas for ID chicks: post #5609
Chickencanoes chick/chicken Identification practices post #25833

 

[Sally Sunshine]

One egg made it to lockdown. Looks like I'll need to clean the brooder after all! Also looks like a trip to the feedstore for a companion is in order, as well, if all goes well.

Welp, I'm a little bummed. It's been 11 days cooking & my Tribbles don't seem to be Tribbling. They're mostly clear & 2 are sloshing around. I kinda wanna cry a little.

oh dang!!! sorry!

Ugh! I was supposed to do the final duck candle last night. Oh well!

Update: I set 10 eggs, and was waiting for my special silkie to hatch! It finally hatched!!!!

And I am in love!

It doesn't look at all like I thought. The mom is best of show blue, and just beautiful!!!! The dad is actually a white silkie that when mixed with my splash, has produced a beautiful blue silkie baby, so I assumed that it was either black or blue underneath. BUT, this baby is actually chipmunk colored! It will be very interesting to see how it grows up. Would love to know where the chipmunk came from. It is an absolute fluff ball!!!! Anyway, I am thrilled to finally have a baby from her. She is older, and I have not gotten a fertile egg from her in over 2 1/2 years!!!! So, this one is very special!

Hatch progress: 1 gorgeous silkie, and 4 rocks. 2 blue silkies from my other parents still in the bator internally pipped. And, I had 1 silkie and 2 rocks die after lockdown.

I'm not sure why I am losing babies after lockdown. There seem to be a couple each time. I did notice that my temp dropped right after I added water at lockdown (added nice warm water.) Would that have killed them? It did drop to around 95 for what seemed like overnight, but I wouldn't think that would kill them.

Eggtopsy: no internal pips on any of the three. Membranes seemed fine. Yolk sac almost completely absorbed on one, and more yolk sac showing on the others. The silkie did have a vaulted skull. Everything looked fine otherwise.

I did accidentally pull a chunk of shell off of one that is still alive,

but luckily felt it move immediately (I always go in slowly, just in case) Grabbed a chunk of shell from another egg, and put it on, to cover the hole after moistening the membrane, and put it back in the incubator. So patiently waiting for those last two to hatch.

no not at that stage it wouldnt kill them. congrats and good luck with the rest. Are they malpositioned?

External pip on the egg my broody is over! I'm off to work so I'll check for a chick poking out from between her feathers later

:

yay chicky!!

 

[Sally Sunshine]