Incubation, Days 1-8!

 Spring is the time of the year that first grade students at JJ Flynn Elementary in Burlington hatch baby chicks in their classrooms. School closures have impacted access to so many cool things, but my family realized that this is one place that we could make a difference, since we already raise chickens as pets. 

Boo!

So, with the help of a new Hovabator Incubator and the generous donation of thirteen Lavender Orpington eggs from our friend farmer Pat Barberi of Heritage Hens Homestead in Berlin, Vermont, we proudly introduce the first day of incubation of the Flynn eggs! 

We will post a daily update on the JJ Flynn PTO Facebook page, with that day's news and embryonic stage. 

These little eggs are being kept at a cozy 99.5-100.5 degrees Fahrenheit. Below is the 21 day development cycle, and they should be hatching on April 29! 

In the last few years, all of our hens have come from Pat's farm, where her hens are raised cage-free, free-range, and free of hormones and antibiotics. Chickens are much smarter than most people believe, and come running for treats just like puppies. 

We will be having a naming contest for the chicks! Flynn students can submit their suggestions, and we will hold a vote to choose the most popular ones!
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Incubation, day 2!

It's been 48 hours since the JJ Flynn eggs entered the incubator! So, what happening in there? The heart and blood vessels are forming! 

Here's info from the website Raising Happy Chickens: "The embryo's blood vessels are now forming and within two or three more days will become visible in candling. By just before the end of the second day of incubation they have joined up with the heart which now actually begins to beat, although it's undetectable unless you have a specialist device. Also today, the chick's ear is beginning to form as are two separate circulatory systems, one to provide the embryo with nutrition and the other to take away waste." 

Also, here is a photo of the breed these eggs come from, lavender orpington.

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Incubation, Day 3!

Flynn egg incubation, day 3! What's going inside today? Today, the heart of the chick embryo begins to beat! If you had really special equipment, you could even begin to hear it. The little blood vessels grow out into the yolk, which is the bright golden part, which the embryo (fancy word for the development chick) will use for nutrition until it can hatch. 

Here is a diagram of the egg! The germinal disc is the tiny spot you can sometimes see in an egg, and that is where the embryo begins to develop, and it's the spot from which those blood vessels begin to form. 

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Incubation, day 4!

Today begins the tiny formations of all the internal organs of the eventual developed chick. This day also begins the formation of the structures of the mouth and tongue. Have a look at this little video to see the tiny web of the heart and blood vessels to see the earliest view of a Flynn chick! See more updates and keep up with the daily growth at the JJ Flynn PTO Facebook page. 

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Incubation, day 5! 

The beginnings of the bones of the chicks are forming. Today is the day that the embryos become either male or female, as it is when the reproductive system is starting to form! 

Here is a cut-away diagram from raising-happy-chickens.com, which illustrates day 5 of incubation. Also, it's pretty neat how bunch of new families are following the PTO page to see the chicks' development. If you know another family that might like to watch this process, feel free to invite friends to follow our science journey. 

From raisinghappychickens.com

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Incubation, Day 6! 

Flynn Fireflies, I am SO excited to share these photos of our eggs with you. The top left photo of this collage is what one of our Flynn candled eggs looks like through a regular lens. The rest are actually the exact same photo I took, with the contrast, brightness, and saturation adjusted to really enhance the appearance of the parts of the egg. You can see the air cell very clearly at left, which will get larger as the embryo grows. Today, the egg tooth begins to grow, which the chick will use to exit the egg when it hatches. Also today, the tiny beginnings of the downy feathers begin, called the feather germs. 

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Incubation, Day 7!

 First is a photo of lavender orpington chicks. Aren't they so cute? 

Also, here is a link to the Hamburger Hamilton stages of egg development, which is a progression of 46 discrete developmental stages in chicken embryo development. It's pretty interesting to read about. Today the Flynn eggs are about at stage 31, and in if we had a microscope, the embryos would look just like the black and white photo here. Look at how big the head is compared to the body, and the eye is absolutely huge! 

From embryology.med.unsw.edu.au

If you want to read more about it, here is the link to the HH scale: https://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/…/Hamburger_Hamilton_Sta…

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Incubation, day 8! 

Check out this awesome imagery of one of the Flynn chick embryos in motion this morning!