i'm curious as to what u all have in the bators for hatching, or will be hatching or what peeps u are ordering in and from who this spring? i know every year we all think oh gosh what can i add to my flocks. so post away so others can get some ideas of mabe some new breeds they might want to add.
silkie
i just added 2 bantam cochin frizzle peeps one black and one splash, they are adorable!!
in the sportsman i have 103 eggs i think i lost count,lol. some breeds are new, some new bloodlines. we are not ordering peeps in cause we are hatching them all.
we have in-
silkies-white, buff, gray, splash, blue
seramas
buff orps
orps-blue/black/splash and mottled
white and black showgirls
mixed color silkies
drk rir rose combs and single combs
i think that's all of them first 1.5 dz which is silkies and seramas just went in the hatcher a few hours ago.
what are u hatching or getting for spring??
Well, let's see...I am hoping to hatch Black Australorps and RIR/Australorps. Since I have all Australorp hens but have Rocky (my RIR) plus two Australorp roos, I guess that's it. Unless it's like when we first started with chickens. We acquired (free) several breeds from people that got the bug and then got bugged out because, let's face it, chickens are messy and some people can't deal with that.
Also, I am getting 10 guinea keets from Ideal in May.
And that's about it.
i've never had lorps but they are very nice breed. forgive my ignorance but are they a brown or white egg layer? we had hatchery quality rir hens last year eggs where xl jumbo and huge!! excellent eating for my family of 7. after the fairs(one took 2nd and one 3rd) i gave them away to an elderly neighber for eggs and companions.
i miss my girls i carried them around every where with me they where a hoot! so the new eggs in for rir are from exhibition stock. there is single and rose comb in i've never had rose comb so i hope at least 1 hatches since she had a pair of them. i can't wait for them to grow up to get huge brown eggs again. u should see the size of these eggs they are bigger than mine ever laid!! i'm curious to how big these babies will hatch out,lol.
Australorps are brown egg layers. They aren't a real large chicken, but not really medium either. The eggs vary in size from large to jumbo. I am not into show chickens, just eggs and meat birds. I do remember my buffs being larger than these. But, still I like these and maybe I will be getting larger chicks because of the RIR/Australorp mix.
We just ordered some more bantams from Ideal.
Birchen Cochin
Sebrights
and some Blue silkies
We also orderd a couple more Astrolorps and some Buff Orpingtons. Buffs are suppose to be good setters so we are hoping that when they get old enough they will hatch more and maybe even hatch some adopted eggs from the other chickens. Our RIR's don't seem interested in setting. We had one Astrolorp that sat for us last year. Poor thing hatched out everyone elses eggs but none of her own.
I don't know about Buffs. When we had them, they never even thought about setting. We did have one RIR hen that started to set for us, but then she broke the eggs and ate them. The Australorp we just had setting would probably have hatched the chicks, but it got too cold in the henhouse and the eggs froze (not really froze, but the embryos died). I banded her so we can set her again if she goes broody when it's warmer.
if they won't hatch them the silkies will they will hatch anything,lol.
I have heard that about bantys too.
I haven't posted here in awhile! I have two orders in to hatcheries-they were due this week, but I delayed them until March because of the weather. My luck though, and it won't be any warmer.
I have a Welp order with:
buff Cochins-5
blue Cochins-5
dark and buff Brahmas-4 and 2
EE's-4
blue Wyandottes-4
Salmon Favorelles-6
one Sumatra
My Ideal order has:
buff laced Polish-6
white crested blue Polish-4
porcelain D'uccles-3
golden neck D'uccles-3
blue swedish ducklings-2
khaki Campbell's ducklings-3
I also have my very first batch of eggs in a borrowed incubator. It's my test run, so the eggs are all mutts, mainly my buff Brahma roo, with light and buff Brahmas, white Rocks, 1 Speckled Sussex, and maybe the golden spangled hamburgs with their roo. I also have a pretty EE roo, but I don't think my big boy shares his girls, lol! I started out with 16 eggs, but 7 were clear. 8 left, due on Saturday hopefully :)
Here's hoping you have a great hatch, Brahma! Please keep
us posted and don't forget pictures! :o)
brahma,
are the favs bantam or standard? i have bantams and need to add another bloodline. i didn't know any hatcheries carried them. would love to see pics of ur buff polish as they grow. i think i'm gonna order more polish from them this spring. i love them!! the w/c blacks and blues i got from them where gorgous and so are the reds. let me know how ya like the buffs i might just put them first on my list along with more of the others. let me know how their cochins are too. i've been thinking of getting some of those also since we now are raiseing bantam frizzled ones so i can add non frizzled to breed with them.
well im not getting much just 5 frizziles so i can cross breed with silkies some cochins and buff orpingtons and may get a suprise batch from mcmurry
Thank you Truest :) I will definitely post pics!
Silkiechick, I ordered the standard Favorelles. This will be my first Favorelles, Polish and Cochins, lol! I do love my big chickens though, and if they have good temperments, beards/muffs and/or crazy hair, all the better! :D I'm glad to hear you really like your Polish, I fell in love with the buff laced color, and the fact that it's a Polish is all the better. Feathersite has a picture of buff laced Brahma's, that someone is working on-Beautiful! My Favorelles are coming from Welp's, but I *want* to say Ideal has them under the tinted egg layer section. I'd love to see pics of your red Polish, if you have them. Oh, and my Cochins are standard size-I wanted to try out the "natural" incubator, lol! I have a bad feeling my feed bill is going to go through the roof, with the large fowl I have now, and the ones coming....:)
Dawn
Hi all. I stumbled into this forum by accident and have been reading here for 2 hours and love it. I ordered my incubator a month ago and I put in 100 bobwhite eggs 10 days ago. I candled the eggs this morning and 14 look blank. All the rest look like the pictures I have found on the internet. Twenty years ago I hatched 68 bobwhite in an incubator and when they got big enough to eat my husband cleaned four for supper. I could not take a bite!!! The next day while he was at work I opened the pens and turned them all out. When hubby came home there were quail in all the azalea bushes. They stayed around for a couple of years and eventurally moved on to the woods behind our house. I have matured and have plans for the quail and I have put in an order for 100 day old ringneck pheasants. I am retired and have to much time on my hands.
Question? Are the blank eggs dead?
i got my favs from a private breeder. i love them!! i'll have to take some updated pics cause they are all alot older now but winter here so i haven't done any new pics of the ones outside. my one male is just now getting his adult feathers in so he looks way different now and the other is younger he is the one pictured. this is the link to my site with my photo albums. i have pics of most of my breeds on there but no where near all the breeders i have a lrg flock. the polish and favs are both there along with others, my cochins r bantam frizzled they are in the nursery 08 album. click on the album it opens up with more pics. http://www.picturetrail.com/photos/keystone_bantams the blues and red polish r the only colors i have now but come spring i want to get more colors for them.
buff laced was the first color i fell in love with too!! i haven't seen the buff brahmas yet i'll have to look. my friend raises the light brahmas i like those they r really friendly and nice and big egg layers. i didn't know any of them had favs so i'll look around they may only carry the standard size. favs are rare and on the critical list but bantams are harder to find them in i've only found 2 private breeds with them.
welcome river, glad u could join us!!! u will love hatching again!! glad to see u are back at it!! bobwhites are fun to hatch last year we hatched and raised hundreds of cotunix and button quail to eat and sell. i ate the eggs hard boiled but couldn't eat the birds after we culled them,lol. the bob whites we released into nature along with 2 pheasant eggs that were given to us when we bought eggs that we hatched. coturnix were the ones the fam ate. by 10 days if u can tell they are clears it means they are not fertile nothing grew in them unless they got to cold it could be they froze. i have to watch that here since it's winter if i don't collect fast enough or i get them shipped in they can freeze.
Well it sounds like most of you are ordering this year. I planted 6 ameraucana bantam and 1 silkie under a broody and i got my first piptoday. I cannot wait to see how this week goes as i added 2 a day to the hens clutch. So i hope to see 2 a day hatch. Keep your fingers crossed that they all find their way out :)
Hi, Silkie, your album is very nice. The only thing this ole lady had trouble with is the captions being written in yellow. They were hard for these old eyes to read. But, the pics were outstanding.
Thanks for sharing them with us.
And, update them when you can.
thanks granny, i have a hard time with the yellow too but i have to change the whole layout to do it. it won't let u change just the writting color for it, ya have to change whole background and everything to something else. i haven't found another layout i like yet,lol. i'm glad u liked the pics. i just updated some over the last few days. now that one of the new hatches is done and they r finally up and walking i have to get some more pics of them. the others i haven't yet cause it's winter. will update more as soon as i can.
your very welcome and thanks again,
silkie
Silkie, yes, it is winter. Hey, we got warm today. I think it went all the way up to about 25 deg. I am not even thinking about doing anything with chicks until it warms up here. We had frost one year (about 5 yrs ago) on the first of JULY!! And the summer was only two months long. We had our first frost that year the first part of September, but usually it warms up enough to do things around the first part of April, so I will be filling the incubator around the middle of March.
This is what we are getting
5 Golden Sebright Bantams
5 Silver Sebright Bantams
2 Golden Lakenvelder
3 Buff Orpington
1 White Cochin
2 Production Red
2 White Silkie Bantam
2Gray Silkie Bantam
1 Salmon Faverolle
2 americanas pullets
Our order should arrive March 7th. We are excited.
Here is my list of eggs in the bator:
36 - Serama bantam (of 61 originally set)
12 - variety bantam Rocks (the TAC eggs!!! LOL)
4 - White-faced Black Spanish bantam
12 - standard Ameraucana
12 - standard All-white Ameraucana (in transit)
Day-old standards arriving week of 3/3
5 - Buff Orpington
5 - Barred Rock
5 - Gold Laced Wyandotte
5 - Silver Laced Wyandotte
5 - Blue Laced Red Wyandotte
5 - White Wyandotte
10 - Silver Pencilled Wyandotte
10 - Black Wyandotte
10 - Blue Wyandotte
10 - Buff Wyandotte
10 - Columbian Wyandotte
10 - Partridge Wyandotte
Eggs ordered for April
6 - Royal Palm Turkey
6 - Narragansett Turkey
6 - Black-winged Bronze (crimson dawn) Turkey
24 - Columbian, Buff Columbian, and Partridge Rock bantam
36 - Mallard duck
I must be out of my mind - Thank God I have a barn
LOL....Yeah, i need a barn too :) I would love a few Buff orpington Bantams *sigh*
LOL, maniac, you ARE!
I just convinced DH that it is time to convert the old horse barn for the coming guineas and turkeys this year!
can't wait to see pics!
What are you getting for turkeys TF?
haven't decided between the heritage breeds. bourbon red is on the top of the list though! the midget whites look cute.... but who wants to eat a midget turkey???
thinking abou tthe slate blue turkeys, but don't know anything aobut them. just they would sure look pretty with the coral blue guineas!
I've been looking through all the hatcheries listed here on DG and only found Meyer that carries Black Star and Buff Orpingtons. I was hoping to find Blue, Splash or Black Orpingtons but haven't found a hatchery yet. Maybe I'll google!
tamaraFaye, I don't think I could eat a midget turkey either!!
i bought eggs for blue/black/splash and mottled orps off of a member of byc. i can look see who it is so u can contact her to see if she has any available and the breeders are show quality if ur intrested. my buffs i got in also i got from a local organic farmer. i can see when she will have eggs available again also if u are interested. they are good quality breeders also. let me know and i can d-mail ya info if ya'd like.
silkie
I used to have one of styrofoam incubators and tried hatching my own chicks but after three attempts I gave up. I ended up giving the incubator to one of our friends who hatched geckos! The eggs would develop to about the 19 day and then die. So I was doing something wrong! Since then I've been buying day-old chicks. I wish I had better luck-it's nice when you know a breeder that cares about quality and keeping true to the breed.
Sue
Maineiac, where are you ordering yours from? I'm looking for blue-laced reds. Of course I don't want 25 though.
Ok now after reading through a couple of threads, I'm adding silkies to my list!! I'm leaning towards blue silkies. How hardy are they?
I'm trying to check out these chicks w/out my 4 year old nephew figuring out what I'm doing or I'll be having two of everything!lol!
but you need two of everything!
don't forget bantam cochins! we went to a ;breeders farm yesterday. she had full grown cochins for sale. but we will wait till she has chicks-they are black standard and they show them and win. what she has for sale are the culls i am sure LOL
so at the feed store, what did they have but a bin of asstd bantams! we picked out all that we thought were bantam cochins, and one other too...
Patchouli, The BLR's are from McMurrays. They do have a minimum mixed order of 25.
Well nuts.
have ya all checked tractor supply? this year ours is gonna have peeps for the first time in years since the AI scare. they are getting them in april 15th in many breeds. so if u live close to one check them out and see. i called ours and asked and was surprised they said yes. so i'll be going to see what all i can find good to get.
Silkie, You sure April 15th.. I was at a supply place yesterday and they are pretty much all set up just waiting on their order.
They are planning a big open house this weekend, so I kind of figure they will probably be in then
Our guys get their chicks from Ideal, but they do require you buy 25 chicks.. I haven't figured that out yet.. there is a sign that says its state law.. rumor always was to keep people from buying them for Easter.
I wish I could buy 1, just to get me through when my get here...
i can send you six eggs, you can buy one of those tiny bators i saw in the Meyer Hatchery catalog, i think it holds four or six eggs...
it would give you something to do LOL
Fran, I just ordered from Ideal and they don't require 25, but they will include roosters if you buy a smaller order. I ordered 10 guineas and they will be coming on May 14th. I don't care if they send me roosters as they will become dinner. (We ate one of or last's years batch of McMurray roosters Saturday.)
I have never heard of there being a state law requiring a minimum order of 25 chicks, but there might be in Illinois.
part of their Animal Welfare Act: [hey i was curious!, so i googled]
(510 ILCS 70/4) (from Ch. 8, par. 704)
Sec. 4. Prohibited acts. No person may sell, offer for sale, barter, or give away as a pet or a novelty any rabbit or any baby chick, duckling or other fowl which has been dyed, colored, or otherwise treated to impart an artificial color thereto. Baby chicks or ducklings shall not be sold, offered for sale, bartered, or given away as pets or novelties. Rabbits, ducklings or baby chicks shall not be awarded as prizes.
A person convicted of violating this Section is guilty of a Class B misdemeanor. A second or subsequent violation is a Class 4 felony, with every day that a violation continues constituting a separate offense.
(Source: P.A. 92‑650, eff. 7‑11‑02.)
it doesn't mention 25. maybe that is the stores way of ensuring that they are not "pets or novelties", since 25 is like a flock.
Illinois also has attempted to enforce premise registration to participate in NAIS, esp with 4-H and fairs...
sorry to get off topic LOL
tf
i ordered from ideal last year and u don't have to buy 25, i didn't and got x-tra rir males for warmth.
yes i called she said on or around april 15th to call back to check what day they get them in. she said there would be both males and females she thought 3 bins of them pullets, males and straight run. u can buy as little or an many as u want. there would be several breeds available.
Thanks for the offer Tamara, I think I'll make it to the end of March.. much as I don't want to wait.. It's probably a good thing.. a little warmer.. you know...
And the egg thing.. Oh the stress.. I might have to watch a chicken do it first.. lol
I knew you didn't have to buy 25 directly from Ideal, but our local farm store is buying their chicks from Ideal and reselling them to the public.. but as I said, min. 25.. and straight run.
I Just though with PA being Zone 6 you guys would be warming up faster than us.. and maybe they would be seeling earlier than here.. boy was I wrong.