Waiting For Eggs To Hatch

I am sure you have heard of the expression, watching paint dry. It is a boring, thankless activity which demonstrates when something else is mind-numbingly boring.

I have a new idea for a phrase which means a similar thing.

That’s right folks. When most normal people are sat watching Saturday night television with a packet of crisps (family sized obviously) and a glass bottle of wine, I have been staring intently at my incubator.

I wrote a post a while back-my own guide to keeping chickens and you will see there that I said hatching eggs was one of the cheapest ways to get hens.

It still is-most hen breeds cost around £1 per fertile egg compared to around £15-25 for a point-of-lay chicken but I did forget to mention the price of the incubator.

Or the fact that if you buy a mini incubator online, it will be so small that it wouldn’t look out of place in your five-year old’s dolls house.

I put the seven eggs in the mini incubator but decided to treat myself to a better one.

The result? I currently have 33 eggs in incubators. In my kitchen.

Husbter is not happy. He hates anything remotely animal in the house (apart from the dog(s)). I am so obsessed though that I can’t bring myself to put them outside. Plus, I can keep a close eye on them.

I have been despairing at myself. Hen eggs take around 21 days to hatch. They have to be turned at regular intervals each day-as a mother hen would do with her feet and you either do it by hand (like the mini one) or have the machine do it-like the bigger one.

On Instagram, I posted a photo of the mini incubator and actually hashtagged #Day1. So even at #Day20 they are still going to look like eggs.

I am going crackers.

I know.

Can you imagine if they don’t actually hatch? Or are all cockerels? I don’t know what’s worse.

All I do know is that I currently feel like a mother hen. Sat on her nest, waiting for her chicks to hatch.

So forget watching paint dry, I’d take that any day over waiting for eggs to hatch.