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To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2017 8:39 pm
by Ontario Chick
just thinking out loud here.....
on recommendation of my old body, I have decided not to hatch this year and hand the trauma over to Millpond
Hatchery, so far so good right?
I have two breeding pens, #1 Columbian Wyandottes, #2 Blue Columbian male over Blue wyandotte hens.
In theory I could collect about 80 eggs in 10 days.
I only need about 6-8 pullets for replacement, and hopefully one Super Cockerel.
I wouldn't bet the farm on the fertility, so conservatively I could get 40 chicks. Which is a bit more then I need.
I could also get 80 chicks, which would definitely be too many.
To complicate things a bit further, I put the Blue Columbian male over the Blue hens in to the Kipenjungle "What will I get" test and since I know the male breeding 4 years back the results were a bit stunning, based on 64 chicks hatched, it produced 16 or possibly 32 different varieties, so I could have a serious mess on my hands?
And of course they may all be infertile and I am just counting chicks before I even collected the eggs.
I am hoping for a completely sane person to chime in and tell me where I am going wrong with my calculations.
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2017 9:06 pm
by windwalkingwolf
The drive to Millpond counts as 'shipping', and hatchability will drop some just from the trip. More is better :D
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2017 9:26 pm
by ross
I'm thinking ..hmmmm I'm still thinking
To hatch or not to hatch hmmmm
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2017 9:59 pm
by JimW
Yes with the couple hour drive to Millpond hatch rate could be decreased, so take as many eggs as you can to Mill Pond. Hatch away!!! I hopefully will have chicks next Thursday to pick up from Mill Pond.
JimW
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Thu Jun 08, 2017 6:38 am
by windwalkingwolf
Hana, if you're hoping for a reason for temperance, you won't get it here. Here's the worst case math:
Of a line that throws very true, like your wonderful Columbians, you need to hatch ten eggs to get 3 breeder quality and 1 excellent replacement breeder. To make sure you will have a pair of excellent breeders, you would need to hatch 20.
On to the Blues x blue Columbians... You've kept the Wyandotte 'type' intact. You're 99% to where you want to be. Ignore the online calculator, it's terrible. You're not going to get 32 different colour types, at very worst you'll get 8. Which admittedly can be bad enough just to think about number of chicks you have to hatch to be guaranteed decent breeders, if the one in ten rule applies.
Look at it this way, your birds throw very true to type, which is the main thing. That can only mean that you have a REALLY good eye for picking breeders while very young, since you don't grow out hundreds at a time. SO, stop second-guessing yourself. Easier said than done, I know. Your intuition when it comes to matching up birds is excellent, and you can always eat or sell the oopsies. Relax. Enjoy.
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Thu Jun 08, 2017 9:08 am
by Ontario Chick
I has become very obvious from the answers (Thank you all and 2x to Jan) that I have chosen right place to ask the question, so I would get exactly the answer I wanted to hear.
I did know ahead of time that completely sane people are few and far between amongst poultry fanciers :)
Re: To hatch or not to hatch.... OK, You made me do it...
Posted: Thu Jul 13, 2017 8:45 pm
by Ontario Chick
windwalkingwolf wrote: ↑Thu Jun 08, 2017 6:38 am
Hana, if you're hoping for a reason for temperance, you won't get it here. Here's the worst case math:
Of a line that throws very true, like your wonderful Columbians, you need to hatch ten eggs to get 3 breeder quality and 1 excellent replacement breeder. To make sure you will have a pair of excellent breeders, you would need to hatch 20.
On to the Blues x blue Columbians... You've kept the Wyandotte 'type' intact. You're 99% to where you want to be. Ignore the online calculator, it's terrible. You're not going to get 32 different colour types, at very worst you'll get 8. Which admittedly can be bad enough just to think about number of chicks you have to hatch to be guaranteed decent breeders, if the one in ten rule applies.
Look at it this way, your birds throw very true to type, which is the main thing. That can only mean that you have a REALLY good eye for picking breeders while very young, since you don't grow out hundreds at a time. SO, stop second-guessing yourself. Easier said than done, I know. Your intuition when it comes to matching up birds is excellent, and you can always eat or sell the oopsies. Relax. Enjoy.
The babies are here, the babies are here!!!!
Why didn't I think of this 10 years ago???
No trauma, well OK the last hour before they arrived I was a mess,
Jan, for your kind words, there is a guessing game coming up your way....
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Thu Jul 13, 2017 8:54 pm
by Killerbunny
Thanks to OC and her DH for arranging the transport. I have 12 more of Chunky's offspring now over Kibbles and Bits. Lovely clean vigorous chicks. DH has bets going on how much I sleep tonight (or not)!
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Thu Jul 13, 2017 9:22 pm
by Shnookie
Congratulations on your "instant" chicks! How many hatched successfully from the eggs you took?
Re: To hatch or not to hatch....
Posted: Thu Jul 13, 2017 9:38 pm
by Happy
Yay!
