Hi I am nbstuart and have been buying and selling eggs for hatching for some years now .Here are a few things to consider and a few tips to help you get the best results from your purchase.

When buying eggs it always pays to try and go for the ones advertising "special delivery next day " service,it costs more but the eggs are kept separate from the normal mail. Another advantage is that they are not put through the machinery and are generally sorted by hand.

Look for sellers who pack in polystyrene boxes specially made for sending eggs through the post,you will have less broken ones.We supply these to quite a lot of buyers now through our ebay shop dransfield-poultry and also through our website dransfieldpoultry.co.uk and if you check out our feedback then check the feedback which our customers get you will see the results which packing this way produces.

. Eggs are remarkable in that they will keep for 10/15 days if kept cool. [10/12 degrees c]

When they arrive open them and check to see they are all ok, removing any wrap,  leave the top of the box off . If you are not going to hatch them immediately,put them with the eggs pointy end down in  the box and tilt the box to about 45 degrees.(recent test have shown that if you are leaving them for more than 5 days put them blunt end down for the first 5 then pointy end down for the rest of the time) Then twice daily move the box to 45 degrees the other way from \ to / until you're ready to put them in your incubator,or under your broody.

When you get them {and i don't want to teach granny to suck eggs just want to be helpful } please rest them for 24hrs before putting them in the incubator or under a broody,if you are going to incubate them strait away this should be at room temperature.If not 10 degrees c

I set my incubator [forced air auto turn] at 37.8 c and humidity around 45/55% and now I always put the eggs pointy end down not on their side and turn them through 42 degrees either side .

Leave them for 17 days for bantams 19 days for large fowl and then lay them on their side, but don't turn them at all for the last 2 days. If you can increase the humidity to around 65/70% for this period that would be better . I have had better results since I started doing them this way.

Anyway best of luck with the hatching .

And one other thing don't give up too early as I have had eggs hatch after 22/25 days when I had totally given up on them .