Hatching Eggs Wanted for School

[Northernplan]

Hi everyone, My daughter is in reception in our local village school having gone up from the local playgroup. Having heard that we have a couple of small incubators and have hatched our own chickens they have decided it would be great to hatch a few at school. Playgroup are planning to do the same having seen our chicks. We have said that they can use our incubators but, as we have no cockerel we cannot give them any eggs. The incubators are small ones which only hold 7 eggs each and so we would only need a maximum of 14 all together. If anyone would be willing to donate a couple of eggs they would be most welcome. We would pay postage for them. If poss auto sexing birds or birds which are reasonable distinctive to sex as chicks would be better so the children can see what they have hatched. If you can offer any could you please reply to this post so we can co-ordinate getting the eggs.

Thanks in advance

Libby

 

[chrismahon]

Hi Libby. Notice you have had no replies and thought I would suggest re-posting in Spring. Hens won't generally lay until they have at least 10 hours daylight so at the moment hatching eggs are unavailable and anyway the weather is unsuitable for the follow -up rearing. What will you do with the chicks afterwards, particularly the 55% cockerels?

 

[Marigold]

Yes I agree, as a former Primary school teacher I would recommend starting this project ASAP after the Easter holiday, so the eggs will hatch 3 weeks into the term and you could keep them in the classroom in a brooder until half term, when they could move to their more permanent home.
A couple of people on here last Spring asked for advice about hatching ducklings in a classroom and came across some aspects you might not have considered, such as whatbtheybhave do with the chicks at weekends, timing the hatch so it is likely to happen at the start of a school week and not over a weekend, power outages to the incubator over a weekend etc.
See for instance this thread http://poultrykeeperforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=5730

 

[Northernplan]

Thanks for that but it looks like we have located some eggs. (I suppose that we have been really lucky in that ours are laying already and someone else we know has some that are) The school don't want to keep the chicks in the classroom after they have hatched (Because of the "what will we do with the chicks at the weekends" issue) and so they will be coming home to us. We have also taken into account them hatching during the school week etc. They have hatched chicks and even ducklings previously at school and so are aware of potential problems. As for cockerels, we have various friends who want cockerels so any that we do hatch will find homes.