Hatching under broody

[Anonymous]

Hi
I have just set some bantam australorp eggs under a broody pekin . I looked at the article on candling on the poultrykeeper website, and it says it is important to candle eggs which are being incubated artificially. So do I not need to candle them?

I hatched some pekin eggs under a broody a couple of years ago, and had great trouble seeing anything when I candled them after 7 days. About half way through incubation I decided one egg was dead because it seemed to be clear and also smelt bad so I threw it away; the other five all proved fertile though one failed to break through the shell.

 

[Tim]

Hi Jackie,

Hmm I think some people do and some people don't.. personally, I usually leave a broody to get on with it and sometimes she will push out a bad egg. If it's going to explode, my guess is she can tell.

During artificial incubation, it is important to candle because if an egg explodes in the incubator, it covers everything in bacteria that quickly multiply and get through the other egg shells and ruin the hatch.

When you candle, it is sometimes impossible to see what is going on. I usually do this in the dark for dark shelled eggs and as you will see in the candling pictures on the PK site, some of these eggs were dark brown copper black marans. I couldn't see anything in daylight, these photos were taken in the dark on an exposure of a second or so.

Another thing you can do is if you see a darker patch, twist the egg gently to rock the contents back and forth. The contents move and you can tell that it isn't just a dark patch on the egg shell.

Good Luck and do let us know how you get on

Tim

 

[Solopuff]

My broody has just hatched 7 out of 10 eggs. I candled them at 7 and 14 days but could only see through the silkie eggs, not the aracauna or cream legbar. The broody broke one which I removed at 8 days and two failed to hatch and were removed at day 24. Neither of these exploded or caused any problems and one was an experiment as it had a peck hole in it which I had covered with nail varnish and micropore tape!
I would say there's no need to candle, the risk of an egg exploding is small. However if you do, seeing the little chick moving around inside the egg is very special.
Good luck with your hatch

 

[Anonymous]

I usually candle at about day 12. I do this as eggs are porous and as such bacteria have no probs crossing the shell barrier - so even if everything looks OK, the good eggs could still be infected by a bad one.

Candle at dusk or night time too as you will be able to see much better and also upset the broody less.