I read somewhere probably on Backyard Chickens (one of the best websites ever), that if you want to have consistant meat birds or steady egg layers that you should hatch new eggs every 18 to 24 months. For most people that means you set some eggs in the incubator or hope to have a broody hen either every year or every other year. We are hoping to start selling some eggs at Granddaddy Garland's road side stand, and I'm looking into selling some hatching eggs as well. Additionally we would like to try to have a few good enough quality birds for Britt to be able to show birds in the Strawberry Festival. For these various reason, we sat some Marans eggs in the bator back the end of February. Unforunately the night the egg turner was taken out the temp spiked up over 110, and none of the eggs hatched. I broke them open today to see how many developed. Seven were fully developed, 2 more quit developing fairly early, and 5 were not fertile. We've made some adjustments, and today another 20 eggs went in. I've never washed the eggs, because washing them takes away their first line of defense in keeping bacteria out of the egg and the developing chicks, but come to find out some people do wash them, and infact almost all hateries wash their eggs before incubating. We have 13 washed eggs in and 7 nonwashed eggs. Additionally of the 13 washed eggs, they recommend that you wait no more than 10 to 14 days to begin incubating the eggs. Some of the 13 have been in there a little more than 2 weeks, so that may further drop our hatch rate. At any rate we are hoping for some more chicks in 21 days.

In other news, tonight, we, I mean I became the happy owner of 6 more hens: 1 Barred Rock, 1 Columbian Wyandotte, 2 Speckled Sussex, and 2 Cuckcoo Marans. After the initial squabbling, they seemed to settle down together. I need some more chicken names. Anyone got any suggestions for the letters R, W, S, and M?