Nasty!

Yesterday was the day I had to perform the lockdown procedure on the eggs I am hatching.  I took the egg turner out and set it down and candled each egg to make sure they actually had something in them.  I put all of the eggs that I could see completely threw into the sink and all the others payed gently into the incubator.  One egg stuck to the turner, so I figured it was cracked and not good.  I took the egg turner into the kitchen to run some warm water on it to see if I could get the egg off without breaking it.

When the water hit the egg, it basically exploded!  It smelled so nasty, I was gagging.  So e of the stuff that came out of it looked like hard boiled egg yolk, some was greenish black nastiness.  The smell permeated the whole house.  It was pretty gross.  I put all of the egg shell outside in the trash after rinsing it off.  I scrubbed the kitchen sink and washed up the egg turner trying to get the broken bottom of the shell off.  11 of the thirty eggs were not fertile and are sitting in the bathroom sink as I write this.  I am afraid to touch them again.  I should have candled all of the eggs earlier in the process, but I only did a few.  I guess I will need some rubber gloves and a container to put them in, I am hoping no more eggs explode.

We had bad storms roll through the area two days in row.  Our house experienced a lot of power surges, but the lights stayed on and just flickered during the surges.  I was afraid the incubator would go off and I would have to figure out a way to keep them warm, I got lucky.  I think I like broody hens a whole lot better than trying to incubate eggs.  You have to make sure they eat and drink, but you don't have to worry about the eggs too much.  The hen takes care of the temperature and humidity.