Egg Candling, incubating, Hatching with photos step by step as it happens

First off: If you're here looking for particular information about your egg; hit CTRL + F This should bring up the "Find" search. Or skim through. This covers shadows, broken yolks, stages of development, what to do or not do. I'm new to this as well I'm sharing my experience with others as I experience it because it's likely my questions will be your questions. 

                                                 What I used to make an incubator
I'll try to make this simple. I bought a fish tank, some sand and a light. Sorry I don't remember the watts or any of that info. It's for reptiles and it's red. The girl at the store told me I could put the light right on top of the cage cover (it's a screen cover) DON'T do that!!! The eggs got WAY too hot!!! Lesson learned. I now have the light fixated about 2 feet above the eggs. I'm sure you can make this work however you see fit as long as the eggs stay warm. I have about 3 inches of sand so I dig the eggs in the sand and cover them with the sand. I also spray water on the walls and on the sand where the eggs aren't laying to help the humidity. I do this about twice a day. I turn my eggs 3-4 times a day, but there have been days I didn't turn them at all. I like to spray the actual eggs about once a day and lightly cover them with sand. I sprayed too much water once and the sand being too wet the eggs were not being kept warm. DON'T do that! :)  NO, I DON'T CHECK THE TEMPERATURE OR HUMIDITY LEVELS OR ANYTHING LIKE THAT. THESE EGGS HATCH JUST FINE IN THE WILD AND I'M PRETTY SURE MY HOUSE HAS A MORE CONSISTENT ENVIRONMENT. I read all these things about people doing this.. I suppose that's for hardcore hatchers. I'm just a girl trying to hatch some eggs I found at a pond. (I don't suggest taking eggs from anywhere. I know here it's illegal but if I don't take them the kids do and break them. At least I'm TRYING to hatch them and they will be released back at the pond of which they came from)

Eggs 1-5 are of various unknown ages, and unknown types. some look like chicken eggs, others are duck eggs, I'm hoping I have at least one Muskovy duck egg but who knows. Why is this important to know? Because I'm using various types of eggs and the same incubation for all of them.

Things I've learned so far. Blood rings aren't always bad! Spots aren't always bad! What IS bad is no development. If you're looking at your eggs and nothing is changing, it's probably a bad egg. I keep all my "bad" eggs just in case and a few have surprised me. Here's how this has gone.

Egg 1:

Egg one day first check-in

*First day of check-in: There's a yolk, moves freely, and there's a "spot" with-in the yolk. The air-sack was visible but had an orange ring forming around it. (it's not always visible when the eggs are new.) Looked good to me.

Egg 1: Second day of Check-in 

*Second check- in TWO days later: I had a hard time describing what I saw. The yolk was significantly larger, taking up about half of the egg.  The "Spot" was now gone but I could see something in there. I also saw what might be a blood ring forming. The air-sack had not grown either yet the ring was gone.  I got a bit worried.

Just an extra pic

* Third check-in TWO days later: Something was a bit more visible. The blood ring no longer looks like a blood ring, more like veins now. Many more red lines. Good things I didn't throw him out :) (Will post pics later)

Apparently to a noob like me; veins can be mistaken for blood rings. Don't throw eggs out until you are SURE it's no good and no development is happening. As long as there is change going on, keep it.

Egg 2:
*First Check-in: Looked much like egg one. The "Spot" was smaller

Egg 2: First Check See the "spot"

*Second check-in TWO days later: The yolk was larger and I could see a blood ring forming. I was quite sad. But we kept him. (the blood ring is hard to see in the photo)

* Third check-in TWO days later: Blood ring still there with no further development. I'm about 90% sure this egg is no good. But we keep him anyway. (photos soon to come)

Egg 3:
*First day of check-in: I thought this was an odd egg. I saw a little black dot, or shadow or something in the egg near the air-sack. Possibly a "spot" as well but really couldn't say for sure.
*Second check-in TWO days later: It had a blood ring :/

Egg 3 Good view of a blood ring

*Third Check-in TWO days later: Looked like egg 2 and no different than two days ago :( but we keep him! (Photos soon to come)

Egg 4:
*First day of Check-in: Ok this egg was even more strange than the previous. It had what appeared to be a "light" or something "white" inside the egg. It moved around as I moved the egg. I could also see a possible "Spot" growing next to it

Egg 4 (First) Wish I could get a pic of the "light"

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*second day of check-in TWO days later: The yolk had limited movement, and was now very large. The "spot" and the "light" were now gone and the air sack had doubled in size. The yolk also appeared to be broken.. or leaking.

Egg 4 second check-in

*Third Check-in TWO days later: The egg looked just the same. The yolk still appeared to be broken.

(OK I'm sure you get it by now; I check the eggs every two days)

Egg 5:
*First Check-in: Something  was moving around in there.

Egg 5 First check-in

*Second: The yolk appeared to be broke. I still don't know what to make of this or how it happens..

Egg 5 second check-in

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*Third: The egg looked different more like a new egg (new eggs have light colored yolks and aren't very easy to see. Older eggs have darker yolks and you can better see things growing in it) the yolk still appeared to be broken. I'm going to assume the yolk is now diluted with the egg white and thus it is lighter in color looking more new than old. We keep him anyway.

Egg 6:
 This is day ONE for this egg.
*First Check in: The yolk had limited movement. The other would move when you moved the egg, this one would move; just not as much.I also couldn't find an air sack. If this sounds familiar you might have a brand new egg on your hands.

Egg 6

*Second (now 3 days old) The air sack is now visible. Small "spot" seems to be forming but it's very hard to see. 

Egg 6

*Third (5 days old) The dot is now looking more like a spider. I see possible veins. YAY

Egg 7
This is also day ONE for this egg
*First: I know it's weird to say but I could see a shadow as I moved the egg around. Other than that, looked like a normal first dayer

Egg 7

*Second: (now 3 days old) Air sac has grown and it also now has a "spot"

Egg 7 and it's big "spot"

*Third: (Now 5 days old) The dot is now a "spider" What this looks like is a giant circle with a smaller circle with-in and in the middle is a "spider" with veins.YAY
Now I really liked this egg. It went from having the normal light yolk to this tightly formed, very round, very dark yolk. I wasn't sure if that was good or bad since my other eggs went from yolk to giant oval yolk.  But, I do suppose I just missed that tightly formed yolk due to the unknown age of the other. 

Egg 8
I didnt' make a note of it, but I believe this one is also day 1
*First: The yolk had limited movement. Air sack was hard to see, and this egg is covered with spots! It also had a stronger smell than the other. Questionable egg!! The last thing I want is a rotten egg stinking up my house.

*Second: (now 3 day old) no sign of change

*Third (now 5 days old) Not much has changed. I can see something  but looks like it's a yolker.

Egg 9
This egg is one day old and new to the family of eggs
*First Check: Looks normal except the air sack MOVES! It appeared loose and possibly broken.  Something near the air sac also moves. This could be bad!
*Second: (now 3 days old) This egg now looks like egg 7 used to. Round Dark Yolk. When it looks like this I always think "Yolker" because the yolk seems so small compared to the egg. Keep these for sure. I forgot to look at the air sack. I don't keep my notes with me when I look at the eggs; I like to have "fresh" eyes. I don't want influence telling me to look for this or that. I see what I see and write it down. OK I got up and looked the air sac looks normal now. ***Lesson*** don't throw an egg out just because the air sac looks broken.

Eggs 10,11,12
One day old
*First Check: They all look pretty much the same. Not much to see on the first day.
*Second:(3 days old) They all 3 look the same. Not much difference.

Dang two days took a long time to get here :p
Today is Feb. 27th 2012

So my camera broke and I was not able to get new pictures. I now have a new camera and will be taking pictures!!! Anyway all but egg 7 didn't make it. Egg 7 however is doing GREAT! The spider turned into veins and then into a bird. We are now on day 17 for the little guy. Yesterday I could see through the egg pretty good. I could watch him move. It's been amazing watching him grow. Today... he's quite dark and taking up a lot of room in there. From this morning to now (about 8 hours later) the egg changed a lot inside. He moves around a lot.

As for any other changes I can remember. Egg 1, the one I thought for sure was going to make it, did not. It got darker and darker, then it grew a red spot. Apparently it was a blood spot which is kind of like a blood ring. The blood spot eventually turned black and I had to throw him out. A couple other eggs had the same thing.

I also have two new eggs. They are large, I can only assume to be duck eggs. One was almost twice the size of the other so I thought perhaps one was a duck egg and one was a goose egg; even though they were found in the same nest. They are now 4 days old. Unfortunately they look similar to all the other eggs so I'm not getting my hopes up. The yolks have become quite dark and large with a smaller "spot" with in the yolk area. BUT some good news!!!! I'm actually lying about my hopes being up because I'm REALLY hoping the larger one hatches! Turns out there are TWO yolks in there! That's right, I've got twins. :D

Also I found a rather small egg today. Just sittin out in the open, didn't appear to be even near a nest. "I lay where I sit and I sit where I lay." Many eggs I"m sure get lost in the water because of this. The egg was cold and all alone :( but we will see how he goes over the next few days. This egg is by far the smallest egg I've found here. I"m actually excited to see what comes out if it makes it.
Ok well I'm off to take some pictures.

These are egg 7 :) day 18

"Big Egg" Day 5

this is my twin egg

Egg 2: Second check in(THIS DOESN'T BELONG HERE!)

Giant egg with twins! day 5

ahh these two got stuck together and I'm not sure how to separate them :/

This is "itty" day 2

Giant egg with twin, big egg, egg 7, and itty.

FEB 9TH 1:00am

SO Giant egg appears to have a "spider" in BOTH yolks! I'm so excited but it's so faint and hard to see I can not confirm I can only suspect that's what I"m looking at.

Lesson: Duck eggs by day 5 or 6 you should see the "spider" forming.

Big egg :/ looks like it's starting to form a blood ring. But we will see what happen.

Egg 7 is making it very difficult to see. Moves around a lot

More to come in 2 days. Please feel free to ask any questions.

Itty is doing ok I guess..... There's a "spot" growing so maybe that's agood sign. I wasn't expecting anything due to the conditions I found the egg in. Cold, Alone, and no where near a nest.