They're set in the Brinsea!

I just set the Blue Orpington eggs!  I decided to let the incubator sit overnight and load the eggs this morning...  my foggy memory finally tweaked last night as last year, I loaded the eggs at night (after warming the incubator all day) and found that the temperature was not right in the morning.  By loading the eggs in the morning, I'm able to keep a closer eye on the temperature all through the day ensuring consistent accuracy by the time I go to bed.  A too hot incubator for 8 hours overnight can have a disastrous affect on the hatch rate.

Orpingtons are fantastic chickens.  They are winter hardy, docile and they lay well.  Additionally, they do brood well and make excellent mothers.  Hopefully, our hens will go broody this Spring and hatch out their own eggs.  We had a few "girls" go broody a number of weeks ago, but as we were still in the depths of winter (-25C) with 5 feet of snow AND we were going on holidays, we decided to continue collecting the eggs and not let them incubate.  Poor girls....  I feel so badly doing that but as the hens were in their toasty warm coop, they didn't really know that it was still winter outside!

Our incubator is a Brinsea Octogon Eco 20.  It's economical and easy to use but more importantly for us, it's quieter than other incubators.  This model can hold 24 chicken eggs depending on the size of the eggs.  I have 22 in here but there is room for 2 more eggs.  Eggs can rest laying down or upright as long as the large end of the egg is up (not the pointy end).  Angled sitting is fine, too.  As you can see, the black rails come out and can be inserted where needed to support the eggs and keep them from rolling around.  The eggs rest on the mesh basket ~ the weight of the egg is not actually supported by the rails.

I should also mention that there are 2 troughs in the bottom of the incubator (under the black mesh egg basket).  Those are for water to maintain humidity in the incubator.  I check those every few days and add more water if needed.  In the 2 days prior to hatch time, the troughs need to be VERY full as a higher humidity is require to facilitate a successful hatch.

Excuse the flash in the picture above - it's very early in the morning and still dark...   This is what it looks like all loaded up and closed.  Look below now...

See the octagon shape of the sides?  This is for turning.  Instead of lifting the lid and turning the eggs manually, we simply rotate the incubator forward and backward 3 times/day resting it on each side of the octagon base.  Easy and better for keeping the temperature stable and preventing accidental breakage.  I've left the cord cover off so you can see where it plugs in.  Note the tiny red temperature adjustment screw.

This screw adjusts the temperature by MICRO turns.  Literally, tiny, millimetre, micro  adjustments make a huge difference in the temperature...  

Once it's at the perfect temperature of 99.5F (and stays that way), I'll screw the cover back on to prevent tampering and keep any splashes and dust out.  The temperature goes down initially as the eggs are at room temp going in, but slowly, the temperature will rise today as the eggs warm up.  I'll check it every hour to make sure it's stabilizing well.

We should have chicks hatch out on or around the 30th of April!