WLLady wrote: ↑Tue Jun 12, 2018 3:07 pm
i had one egg like that once and i used scotch tape to hold the shell together. as long as it wasn't leaking liquid.....it made it.....but i checked it every day to make sure that membrane was still intact and nothing was leaking out.
Yep! I've done that too, with eggs cracked that badly, and had them make it. I've also done it and watched dark lines of fungus or bacteria form around the cracks, and when that happens, it invariably results in a dead embryo. The trick seems to be to make sure the tape is tight to the egg--no gaps or crimps or folds. If the egg loses moisture out of the crack, and it condenses on folded or gapped tape, you're in trouble.
Speaking of trouble, I seem to be setting myself up to be over run with babies. In the past month, my hens have been going broody one after the other after the other, some on top of each other within days of hatching. I've been separating these usurpers into their own spots with their own eggs, because "last minute mamas" often get confused, lead chicks away from main mama, and abandon them. Ones that have been co-sitting together for a while, I leave together. I stopped counting broody hens at around 13 hens, now I have at least 18 either with new chicks at heel, or still sitting on eggs. The latest to go down, is an older EE hen named Blue. Blue decided to lay an egg in a broodys nest yesterday, the broody (her name is Nurse) is currently hatching, and EE Blue went "OOH, BABIES!" and has been with Nurse ever since. Blue never left Nurses' nest, and laid an egg again today, but was still stuck tight and talking to Nurse's babies tonight, so I gave her a cage with new eggs of 'her own'. Which she settled happily upon and growled at me. And with that broody transplant, I am officially OUT of coops, storage tubs, milk crates, nest boxes, shelves, floor corners, cat carriers, dog cages, and cardboard boxes to put all the sitting or brooding hens in.
The geese have 9 babies on the ground and one or two more to hatch. April's growouts are running loose, sink or swim. May's chicks and ducklings are in a cage still but allowed to range for several hours a day. May poults are still in the house along with May and June ducklings. June poults aren't doing well, but I just managed to transplant the week-old remainders onto a broody hen and expect them to do better now. Just had three more ducklings hatch, and stuffed them under the hen too. Hen is a very happy hen, and thinks I'm the baby stork and her new best friend.
I have two sets of two hens co-parenting chicks successfully right now, and another pair about to give it a go, but they've been sitting together almost the whole time, unlike Blue and Nurse. I have three (single) hens with babies at heel, and two more hatching.
All along, I've been incubating eggs myself, and with so many broodies, hatches have been serendipitously lining up, so I've been able to stuff my chicken babies under hens along with their own chicks. If Blue sticks it out, she'll have 20 kids or more LOL.
Not having to brood chickens in the house is great, but also nerve-wracking...I spend a good portion of each day running around outside, fussing and fretting, counting little heads.
One of the starlings nesting in my silo, has learned to make the "lost chick in distress" noise, and I swear it does it just to keep me dashing around like an idiot to find the lost baby. When it does it, at first the brooding hens would all congregate at the silo, but quickly realize the ruse and wander away. Now they don't even bother to go check, but I do, every time. Just in case. I think it's laughing at me.
Betty (Bitty), my tiniest and also second oldest home-bred hen, just started laying for the season a week ago...but is already starting to make the chucking noise that they make when the broody hormones begin.
I think I may go mad.