AUSTRALIAN POULTRY FORUM™

I candled my eggs last night the cuckoo ones I got and I had 1 rotten egg. I figured there must have been something wrong with it as it was a solid mass. I threw it out today and yeap not nice.

I have no idea about the others. Some I think yes, some I think no so I figured I would leave them there for another week. I had also put 3 sussex eggs in there from the girl that runs with the silkies and another silkie egg. I had put them in three days before I figured my eggs would arrive but as the eggs were late arriving the sussex eggs are due to hatch next weekend and the cuckoos are not due for another four days after that. It will be interesting how I guggle this one.

Other interesting thing is all sussex eggs have babies in them. So I will soon have susex /silkie crosses running around the place. The silkie egg also has a baby in there.

I decided to do that as I was interested to see what they turned out like if they were fertile. Also proves to me that my neurotic sussex likes the silkie rooster but not the sussex rooster.

I wish I had more confidence with this candling. I have looked up pictures and viewed all the video on Utube. I guess practice makes perfect.

The chicks sure will be intersting looking
cant wait for the pictures

i wil have to come and help you candle the eggs County lodge can't wait for those chicks to hatch

I was wondering how your timid sussex hen was going with the sussex rooster. I guess my question is answered

Yep, she wouldn't have a bar of him and refused to come out of the nesting box for 2 weeks only when I let Larry out to free range in the morning did she come out and feed and sat on the roost for a while but never came out of the pen and when the others went away she went straight back to the nesting box so I gave up as I felt sorry for her and now I have this neurtoic sussex that loves a silkie.

Well they reckon that opposites attract sometimes

They are very boring and maybe even unhelpful, but I've just videoed the candling of a few eggs. I'm uploading them to YouTube.

1. Infertile (very boring)
2. Fertile (not too bad)
3. Fertile 2 (better)
4. Fertile egg suspected to be from one of the dumped chooks (unexpected)

I was a little surprised at the small amount of development (day 5 now). I only did about 7, but a couple had such little development it was hard to see the web of blood vessels. I reckon I probably needed another 0.5-1.0 degree higher for temp.

I'm not keen on messing around with the temp, so will soldier on as is.

Update: No. 1 (the really boring one) is up.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kk5lLYf37y0

Very slow process even though I'm on ADSL and the first video was only 15 seconds. Uploading fertile 2 now. Will upload others some other time maybe.

The one of the fertile dumped chooks egg is the same as egg C of http://www.greenaus.com/chooks/eggsizes.jpg

Update 2: Fertile 2 is up.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00bLzaC-GX8

Country Lodge,
There's a place in the UK that do the Silkie Sussex cross. This is their website. There's not a lot of info, but there is a pic on the page. They look quite interesting.

Sorry - forgot site:

http://www.exhibitionsilkies.co.uk/

I find too that day 5 not much development and in dark eggs it is hard to see, I find if I wait till 7 days it is easier to see and if in doubt I leave it an extra day or two and look again---nothing worse than throwing out eggs you think are duds to find that they weren't cheers pam