How to Hatch Store-Bought Egg Without Chicken Incubator?
The internet is awash with fads and crazy challenges, and one that’s been doing the rounds recently concerns trying to hatch chickens from store-bought eggs using minimal equipment – but is this even really possible?
As it turns out, it is, although it’s far from easy – so for anyone who wants to try, in this post, we have all the information you need about how to hatch a store-bought egg without a chicken incubator.
How to incubate Store-Bought eggs – an overview
Before we look at this challenge and how to approach it, let’s take a step back and think about how to hatch chicken eggs in the conventional way.
To incubate a chicken egg, you need to start with a viable fertilized egg.
By fertilized, we mean the egg was laid after the hen mated with a rooster, and by viable, we mean that the embryo is still able to develop into a chick.
Fertilized eggs can remain viable for up to around ten days before the start of incubation if they are kept in temperatures of around 50-55°F. However, if they are kept any longer – or are kept in temperatures above or below this range – the embryo will die and won’t be able to develop.
Once you have a viable fertilized egg, it needs to be incubated, which means keeping is at a steady temperature of around 99-101°F and at humidity levels of 45-55%.
The egg also needs to be turned several times each day for the next 17 days, and then on the 21st day, if all has gone well, a chick will emerge from the egg.
There’s a little more to it than just this, but these are the basics.
So now let’s think about the challenges associated with hatching a store-bought egg without a chicken incubator – and they’re not insignificant!
The challenge to Hatch a Store-Bought Egg Without a Chicken Incubator
If you want to attempt this challenge, the main issues are finding a fertilized egg that’s still viable in a store and then working out how to maintain the correct temperature and humidity levels for 21 days without using a chicken incubator. Here are the details of what you’re up against.
1. Finding viable fertilized eggs
The first problem that you encounter when trying to hatch eggs bought from a store is that they are unlikely to be fertilized.
Most eggs nowadays are produced through battery farming methods, and battery hens are unlikely to go anywhere near a rooster during their egg-laying careers.
This means if you buy regular battery eggs from a supermarket or grocery store, the chances of hatching a chick from them are essentially zero.
The only way you could hope to hatch a chick from a store-bought egg is if the egg came from a farm where roosters and hens are kept together, either in a pastured or free-range setting.
In such a setting, eggs may be fertilized because the rooster can mate with the hens. We can still eat fertilized eggs because the embryo is not allowed to develop – an egg with an undeveloped embryo inside is all but indistinguishable from an unfertilized egg.
However, even if an egg has been fertilized, it may still become inviable. If an egg is stored in a refrigerator, the low temperature will kill the embryo – and if an egg is kept longer than 10 days, every day after the 10th day will make it more unlikely that it remains viable.
2. Incubation
The second big problem is how to incubate the egg without a chicken incubator.
If by this, we mean without using a professionally made chicken incubator that you can buy, it’s possible to do the job with a DIY version.
However, if it means without any kind of chicken incubator at all, then it’s impossible.
If you just leave a fertilized egg outside of a chicken incubator with the wrong temperature and humidity levels and without turning it, it simply won’t develop (although there is one other option, but we’ll come to that later).
So in short, if you want to have any hope of hatching a store-bought egg, you’ll need to work out how to rig up some kind of DIY chicken incubator because without a chicken incubator, nothing will happen.
How to Hatch a Store-Bought Egg Without a Chicken Incubator?
So having looked at what we’re facing, now let’s think about how it might be possible.
Step 1. Sourcing the eggs
The first thing you need to do is source your eggs, and as we’ve said, battery eggs won’t work because they won’t be fertilized, so you’ll need to look for eggs from pastured or free-range chickens.
Many YouTubers who attempted this challenge suggests that eggs bought from Trader Joe’s can work – and many other people online have also mentioned this.
However, if you buy eggs from a local grocery store that sells eggs from pastured or free-range farms, you also stand a chance of finding a fertilized one.
The next problem is with refrigeration. The best option is to buy eggs that haven’t been stored in a refrigerator, although according to some reports online, some refrigerated eggs manage to stay viable even after being refrigerated – defying the odds and all logic.
Finally, you should also try to buy the most recently laid eggs you can find.
On an egg carton, you will find the so-called Julian number that tells you on which day of the year it was packaged.
To find it, look for a three-digit code. 001 means January 1st, 365 means December 31st and, for example, 032 means February 1st because that’s the 32nd day of the year.
This will tell you how recently the egg has been packaged, and you should try to get one as close to today’s date as possible.
Step 2. Setting up a Chicken incubator
The next step is working out how you’re going to set up your chicken incubator. If you want to complete the challenge without buying one, you’ll need to construct a DIY version.
There are lots plans online, and you can choose to make one from things like a cardboard box, a bucket, a cooler or even an old refrigerator. We’ll leave you to decide which option to go for – but a quick search on YouTube will show you plenty of different options.
Once you have your chicken incubator ready, place the eggs in the chicken incubator, maintain the correct temperature and humidity levels and don’t forget to turn the eggs several times each day.
Since the odds of successfully hatching a chick from a store-bought egg are against you, you’re best off incubating lots together to increase your chances.
Step 3. Checking on the progress
After about five days, you’ll want to check on the eggs’ progress, which you can do by “candling” them. To do this, hold a bright light (like a powerful pocket flashlight) to the egg to see what’s inside.
If you see nothing, it means the egg is not fertilized or the embryo hasn’t developed, so you can discard it.
If you see a red blood ring, it means there was an embryo but that it has died – in this case, it might be worth leaving the egg for a little longer to see if your interpretation was wrong and the embryo is still developing, but the chances are not good.
However, if you see a red spot with blood vessels spreading out from it, you’re in luck and you have a developing embryo in the egg. Place it back in the chicken incubator carefully and continue to monitor it. You can candle it again a week or so later to see if it’s still developing.
Step 4. Hatching
Once you reach day 18, turn the egg for the final time, place it with the thin end pointing down and close the chicken incubator. Increase humidity to 60-65% and don’t open the chicken incubator again until the chicks have hatched.
On day 21 – or perhaps one or two days later – if you have been successful, the chicks will emerge from the eggs and you will have completed the challenge.
Bear in mind that even to get one chick like this will be incredibly lucky, and since chickens are social animals, any chicks that hatch will need to be put with other chicks to keep them company – and not doing so is cruel.
If you don’t have other chicks of the same age, you’ll need to buy some to raise together – and if this is not something you’re willing to do, you shouldn’t attempt this challenge in the first place.
Using a hen to Hatch a Store-Bought Egg Without a Chicken Incubator
We mentioned another way of incubating eggs without a chicken incubator and that’s to use nature’s chicken incubator – a broody hen!
If you have a broody hen that’s already sitting eggs, you can try adding a couple of store-bought eggs for her to sit at the same time.
However, the chances of any single store-bought egg hatching are very low, so you’re unlikely to be successful using this technique – and even if a chick hatches, you might not even know which member of the brood the store-bought individual is!
Difficult – but not impossible
It is possible to hatch store-bought eggs, and it has been done. However, to do so, you will probably need to go through several dozens of eggs to hatch even a single chick, and you will have to make a DIY chicken incubator to have any chance of being successful.
As a result, this can be an expensive and time-consuming way of hatching chicks – but if you feel like trying just to see if you can do it, then it could be a fun and ultimately rewarding challenge to attempt.
Disclaimer : The above is a sponsored article and the views expressed are those of the sponsor/author and do not represent the stand and views of The Tribune editorial in any manner.
