The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Poultry & Waterfowl => Topic started by: Guy on March 12, 2008, 04:42:20 pm
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well as per instructions , i have turned off the automatic egg turner and filled the resevoir with water , as our eggs are now shortly due to start hatching - very exciting - unfortuanately we are now spending every spare second staring at the eggs looking for signs of movement which is sending us a bit cross -eyed :o and more worryingly there is no sign of movement :( - but we have got the cigars and champagne on standby ( although i dont know why my wife likes smoking those big havanas :D lol )
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Nothing wrong with Havana's........ Any pippin yet???
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nooooo , not yet , am starting to get a bit concerned :( - never had a complete batch fail - yet!!
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Is it chickens your hatching Guy? also what kind?
I'll keep my fingers crossed that all goes well :)
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thanks muchly for the crossed fingers , yes they are (hopefully) chickens. we have bought 6 light sussex eggs and we also incubated six of our own which are a cross between light sussex and our cockerel who is a gold laced orpington. should make a nice cross - if they hatch!!! ;)
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How's it going, Guy?
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well , one has started to say hello........ ;D i will keep you posted!!
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It's a very exciting time, can you hear the eggs chirping yet. I had quite poor results from my incy so far, perhaps i shall avoid posted eggs in future. From our last hatching we have 5 cochins, 1 ixworth, 2 welsummer, 2 vorwerk, 3, l/sussex, 1 black orpington, and 2 mottled pekins. I had them in the dining room due to the weather and the liklihood of the power being off due to storms and my oh forced me to put them in the garage last night due to the noise,smell and feather dust. I have also just put in 12 l/sussex eggs and 6 cream legbars in the incy. The chicks are great to watch and we are always a little sad when we move some of them on to new homes. good luck, and keep us all informed of any hatchings.also tell us what the crosses turn out like.
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well , after a couple of sleepless nights we have ended upp with 2 little chooks!! rather a poor hatch rate , but the two we have are well worth it. 1 was a shop bought egg and one was our own ;D they go into their "new room" today and we are going to re-stock the incubator with some more of our own eggs this week ;)
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Nevermind, 2 is better than none and so that's a success in itself. (I've now got to re-pack mybrand new incy due to the move!) When you say "shop bought" due you mean like Tesco's ?? or from a breeder selling hatching eggs? I've heard that a lot of people have bought Tesco cheap eggs, put then in and incy and had success !!
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yes - we are always pleased to get something from a clutch of eggs - and really its the fun we do it for so no great loss to us otherwise. i meant hatching eggs from a breeder (and generally we get good results from the same), although i too have heard of supermarket eggs producing chicks!! hopefully these will both be girls as we want to increase our layer population - but will be restocking the incy tuesday evening with todays eggs from "the girls" - never give up, thats what i say!!! ;) dont worry - you will soon be unpacking your incy - and this time it will be on your own land - fantastic!! :D
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well thetwo new babes are in their brooder unit ( they look a little lost in it as there is only the two) but they seem to be doing well , and i have started off another 8 eggs in the incubator :)
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the two babes are now very strong (and noisy) and their feathers are staring to show through - v . exciting :)
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Any idea if girls or boys yet? ???
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if there tail feathers are pointing up then they should be hens and if there pointing down then there cockrels, well thats how we use to sex ours and it was accurate everytime ;D
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not sure yet blinkers - although one has really fluffy legs like dad , so think its a boy
good tip dandans - i will check it out and see if it is as accurate for ours - ta!!
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we now have 3 more babies arrive - they hatched out on sun / mon and are now in the brooder unit ;D they are buff sussex cross gold laced orpington and the most fascinating colours!! - one is traditional cream ( with a black spot) , one is a deep mahogany and the final one is totally black - never seen anything like it - anyone else come across it before ??? it looks as though a crow has flown down and "seduced" one of my chooks :D