craftyhunnypie Posted July 29, 2007 Share Posted July 29, 2007 Hi everyone! Last week after visiting Garden Poultry - we also called into Happy Hens (Free range egg place) and sister bought some eggs. When we saw the amount of cockerels there were with the hens my sister thought she would put 3 eggs in the incubator at home ( the rest got used up for tea). They have been in just over a week now and my sister has tried candling them - but the shells are so strong and the eggs so chocolate brown that she is finding it hard to tell. So she is giving them another few days or at the most until next Saturday, then will candle them again. She does know what she is doing as had sucessful hatch rates with guinea fowl, goslings & ducklings so far. However, are there any other tests for seeing if there is anything taking place in these eggs? Will she definitely be able to see ' veins / spider like formation' in the chocolate brown eggs if they are developing? With them being so dark. She also has some mixed bantam eggs to go in the incubator if these are not developing. If they are, then she will borrow anothe rincubator from another farmer friend. Just wondered if anyone had any ideas? Thanks Emma.x Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
feemcg Posted July 29, 2007 Share Posted July 29, 2007 Hi Emma, I was able to candle my Marans eggs with my LED candler but its certainly more difficult than with paler eggs, and I always do it at night in complete darkness. I think she should leave them till day 10 or 11 at least and candle again. Also if you leave a fertile egg out the incubator for a few minutes it will stay warm (from the developing chick) and an infertile one will go cold very quickly. This won't do any harm - some breeders 'cool' the eggs for 30 minutes a day and say this gives a better hatch rate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
