April-2012 - Candling new chicken eggs. Day 14

It has been a long time since I last blogged.  I just can only write so much about my chickens.  That and I get busy and time just passes quickly. So I've been pulled back into blogging again by two things. 


1.  I've got another set of eggs in the incubator due to hatch April 20-21.
2.  I got a comment on one of my older blog posts.


So I guess some people actually read this blog.  I write this blog mostly for myself, an online journal of sorts. It helps me remember things I forget from my previous incubations like temperature, humidty, etc.  However I "attempt" to blog as though I might get a reader besides someone in my famly or my friends.


Welcome "gshabir15", my newest follower and commenter.  I hope you have had some success in candling your eggs and finding signs of life. Please drop me a line and let me know how it went.



I put over 40 eggs in the incubator on March 30 but had to remove some a couple of days later.  It was just too crowded and the temperature was too inconsistent on the bottom - a full 11 degrees lower.  Definitely can't grow chicks at 88 degrees.


I candled all of the remaining eggs the other night.  It was very difficult to see through the brown eggs.  I figured 18 of the eggs were no good as I saw no air pockets in them so I discarded those eggs.  


I candled some eggs a few minutes ago and here's some pics.  The top pic is a dark egg - you are looking at the air pocket inside.  The middle pic a closeup of the air pocket of a white egg and you can see the blood vessels.  The bottom pic is the air pocket of the white egg.

I also made a quick video on candling eggs.  It's on my youtube which is under the name "kitchenchickens" as my incubator is right on the edge of the open shelf/wall of the kitchen.  Here's the video:

Since there were so many eggs being incubated it seemed logical to use a different method instead of manually turning all of the eggs.  This time I put the eggs into egg cartons and I lean them sideways.  I just change the sideways direction each time I "turn" the eggs.

I've read you're supposed to turn the eggs 3 times a day which I usually do.  If you forget sometimes don't worry.  I forget sometimes and my chicks have been fine.   Here's a shot of my current setup in the incubator.

We are keeping these chicks but we have someone who wants many chicks so we will be doing some more chick egg incubations after these ones hatch.  


I've also met more "chicken lovers" out there with way more chickens then I have so I'll be posting about them too.  After all, I can only blog about my chickens so much.


Stay tuned - I promised it won't be so long....I'll make an honest attempt to blog regularly.