Anyone Else Getting Ready To Hatch Eggs?

13 years ago

It's that wonderful time of year!

Next week we plan on setting some eggs in the incubator for our yearly Chickam project, where we point a live webcam with sound into our incubators and share the hatch and subsequent chicks growing up with the Internet. It's been really popular in the past, I intend to set the eggs into the incubators next week with a hatch date of March 19th or 20th (the Vernal Equinox, just for fun!).

We'll be hatching a few of our own mixed breed eggs but also some buff & light Brahmas, blue/gray Giant Cochins and black Americaunas. We'll be using two Little Giant 9200 incubators, one a forced air and the other a still air. They've worked OK for us in the past, as long as we don't overload them. So far no broody hens in the flock, although the hens are getting together and laying all their eggs in one nest, so they are plotting along those lines and trying to get SOMEONE to go broody. If we have any likely mamas by hatch time we'll let her raise the chicks, it's so fun to have a mama hen with the babies. :)

Anyone else planning on hatching poultry this year, either under hens or in incubators? If so, what will you be hatching?

Velvet ~:>

Comments (8)

snycal
13 years ago
Oh wow you put it on a live web cam! I like that idea

I wish one of mine would go broody, I don't want to fire up my dickey incubator, costs too much per month for a small hatch but that is just what I would hope for right now.

How do I find your chickam project?

Lisa
Naomi Miller
13 years ago
I just set my first batch this weekend.... I have a Sportsman cabinet and I am starting off with some Buff Orp Banties, Buff Silkies, Seramas, Banty Wyandottes, and Mille Fleur......all these guys are pen raised and the rest are free range, so I have just culled the hens for isolation to purge them for their respective roos, lol....we will start on RIRs and Americanas on the first of March..... I love hatching season and all the babies......we have one broody Welsummer hen right now who is setting on 11 mixed hen eggs so Lord only knows what will come from that, lol.....good luck to all in the upcoming season.....
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velvet_sparrow
Original Author
13 years ago
Ooh, a cabinet! I'd love to be able to move up to one of those. :)

Chickam will be here:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/chickam2008

We've been doing it since 2008, it's a lot of fun. :) Of course, the cam isn't active yet, but if you tune in and see eggs, the hatch is on and about to start! We'll place the cam out in the yard now and then before that, usually pointed at the nest boxes just for fun and to test it.

Also,I'll start a thread here when the hatch starts!

Velvet ~:>
eloise_ca
13 years ago
Looking forward to viewing your hatch Velvet! I wish I could hatch some eggs, but I don't have a broody or incubator.
Naomi Miller
13 years ago
Velvet, the cabinet was part of a double blessing. We have a small hobby farm and I swear I try to have one of every living creature on it, lol. For ages, I had wanted an emu and a friend called and said , contact this lady , you will get your emu.... so I did and what I got was the sweetest lady who was trying to home her late father's emus and wanted only a few dollars for the pair in order to compensate the neighbor who would have to give his time to assist us in catching and trailering them..... as we talked , I told her about all my chickens etc and she said, when you go to the barn there at dad's , look inside , there is one of those incubators and I do not know if it still works but you can have it' I know dad used it up until a couple years ago.....so I did ....got it home, kicked off some dust and she fired right up, works like a charm.....believe me, otherwise , I would still be using them good ole styrofoam baters, lol...... I count that day as one of my most blessed...... got my babies who I adore and a great bater to boot....
velvet_sparrow
Original Author
13 years ago
Aw, isn't it fantastic that there are still such great people around! Glad you scored such a great item! :)

Velvet ~:>
velvet_sparrow
Original Author
13 years ago
We started our eggs on Saturday the 26th, hatch date should be March 19 (give or take, depending on Ma Nature)!

We're hatching: Birchen Marans (instead of the black Americaunas due to a mistake in shipping), Giant gray/blue Cochins, light & buff Brahmas and a few eggs from our girls. All the shipped eggs arrived well-packed and safe, only one Cochin egg was cracked.

Can't wait! :)

Velvet ~:>
goldenpond
13 years ago
I thought my magpie duck would she has been broody but she is spending alot of time off the nest and I felt the eggs tonight at dinner time and they felt cool. My ducks do not seem like good setters,The one good setter I had disappeared. I was REALLY hoping for ducklings but I think she is letting me down
tanya