I quickly candled the Marans eggs this morning, and found a couple clear ones! Clear as in not fertile.
Two of the clear eggs are out of my three black copper marans eggs! I've emailed the breeder---it's a little silly. I would be able to understand broken air-sacs, or cracked shells, or something of that matter, which can easily be caused during shipping, but to have non-fertile eggs.... Typically, any hen in contact at all with a rooster will have fertile eggs, so this is a bit uncommon---especially when I bought fertile eggs! I'm hoping that the breeder will ship out some replacements free of charge, but we'll see.
Also, whilst candling the Marans, I had a quick look at my lock-down eggs. I thought I might have spotted a tiny little crack in one of the white ones (but am not sure) and wanted a closer look. I didn't move the egg, but held the flashlight down to it to look inside, and I can tell you, whatever chick is in there is tiny! Half the egg is open, and not because of the air-sac, which are normally-sized in all other eggs. This is not uncommon, I've seen it before---even in clutches hatched by brooding hens. It's just a very small little baby, which could be because it is very likely that the chick was sired by a bantam rooster, whist the mother hen is a standard.
I've set up a brooder today, just in case we get some hatches! The first three eggs are due tomorrow. I'm mildly concerned about their welfare, simply because of the large drops of temperature during the nighttime, which has been causing some slight sweating of the eggs.
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