Candling Eggs in the Incubator

I tried to get a good photo shoot with our little peeps in the incubator, but they prove to be a little difficult to photograph within the shell!  ha ha.  We went onto YouTube and found some great videos of people testing their eggs for fertility around day 5 and also what the chick embryo looks like around Day 11. I highly recommend doing that yourself.
So we took our little eggs into my darkened bedroom, used a flashlight shining out from a cardboard box/tube to focus the light on the egg. Later on I just used the little "Mag Lite" flashlight in my hand and threw away the box.  Much easier.  We looked quite funny all under my blankets looking at eggs!

This is day 11, you can see an obvious air sac at the bottom, then a dark circle (eye ball) and then the rest is darkened.  This one was moving around!  The darkened is the little chick.

To the middle right you can see a darkened line, that is actually the beginning of a chick!  Like a human ultrasound, it's a spine.

See the dark blob circle?  That is an eye ball and chick forming around day 8

This is one of the little wee bantam eggs around day 5.  Definite blob,eye, and vessels.

We checked all the eggs that we had started March 17th on March 28th.  We threw away 5 eggs.  2 eggs had not done anything, so infertile.  3 had started, then died.  They had an obvious darkened red ring around the blob...they say that happens sometimes because of the incubator.

We actually saw some chicks moving back and forth inside the eggs!  It was so cool!  I tried to video tape it, but my camera abilities don't do it.  If you stop by I'll try to show you one!  God is so good.

Below is another incubator the Hova-Bator...it gently rotates the eggs back and forth and keeps a pretty even temperature.  We started these eggs on March 23rd, but unfortunately I'm not seeing a lot going on in these eggs yet.  Some seem completely clear, a few shows signs of having a darkened area.  The white bantam eggs in here are showing great stuff!  One egg we had was super large, but only 1 yoke, so we started it and we can see it is fertile and has started to develop.

See the huge egg on the bottom left?  It's working, even though I've put it on the mesh because it wouldn't let the thing rotate!  If this big egg hatches out, we said we're naming it Kris, from a friend's older brother... 

he's a tall one and the girls like to tease.  If it's a hen, maybe it will be Kris-tina or Kris-tie...

Canning Saskatoons ~ Jam Recipe ETC

My poor, deprived children and hubby have never tasted canned saskatoons or blueberries.  I set out to remedy this situation and canned me up some saskatoons!  ha ha.
I have many fond memories of Mom's canned blueberries when we lived in Ontario and how us kids would pretend the purple juice was our "medicine".  Can't wait for my girls to take their medicine!
I used to be so afraid of canning, but really, just read the instructions and follow them.  Don't take short cuts, and always put your best fruit in the jar.  It won't come out looking better than it went in.  No food does.  That is the best thing I have learned about canning and freezing...only the best goes in because it won't miraculously convert to something wonderful in the freezer.  Throw it out or use it in muffins, etc.
Anyhow...onto the canning of the saskatoons.  I often give a lot of detail, but this is for my girls benefit.

First, gather your troops to pick the fresh berries.
Sing and pick and eat

In our area in BC Canada, we don't seem to have many wild fruits, etc to benefit from, but I have finally found some saskatoons.  Check in your own areas for what grows naturally... organically and God given for your benefit!

Silly little plastic containers that I didn't throw away from the stores.
The air holes work wonderfully and they stack so nicely.  

Sorted berries, took some time, but well worth it.  Biggest and best for the jars!

 Instead of writing my recipe out, I've copied a link to another web page... try this...
Canning Fruit
I use a ratio of 1:3 white sugar and water and hot water bath my jars of peaches for 20 mins and saskatoons for 15 mins.

Syrup ~ 1 cup white sugar to 3 cups of water.  I used 12 cups water for 7 quarts.
Lids in hot water, clean jars in hot water.
This is sterilizing and getting ready.

Fill the jars up as much as possible by shaking and gently banging the bottom
of the jars on the counter to settle the berries.
Unless you like more syrup and less berries ~

Middle jar first.  The water has already boiled.  Jars are hot.  Syrup is hot.
Otherwise you will have cracking or bursting jars.

Add the other jars alternating side to side so it doesn't tip over

Canning Hot Water Bath time it after it returns to a boil

 Everything is hot hot HOT...so be careful.  One jar did tip over a little on me and lost some juice, so it didn't seal but we can eat it fresh anyhow.

Remember to wash jars off once they have cooled.  Otherwise in the winter
you may give yourself a hernia trying to get the lid off

Approx. 35 lbs of saskatoons in the freezer.

Opps, forgot to say that I usually place my berries on a cookie sheet to freeze individually first, then bag them.  This gets rid of that nasty clumped up bag of berries.  I can just take out however many I need at a time.  Girls love eating frozen berries as well, or putting a few on top of their oatmeal.
We have since learned a trick with taking off the stems.  Freeze clean berries, then when they are frozen, just roll around a bit and all the stems are OFF!

The Pectin I used for the Rhubarb-Saskatoon Jam 

This pectin I saw for the first time, "on sale" in a Safeway store.  I looked at the ingredients and no aspartame, etc, so I thought I'd try it.  So far, so good.  We loved the jam.

So yummy.  It was great warm and then warmed up on waffles the next morning.

My family finds fruit jams too sweet, so I add rhubarb to them.  It also thickens, adds nutrients and we use less sugar than they say and it never goes bad on me.

Saskatoon-Rhubarb Jam

8 cups chopped up rhubarb

1 cup water

Start to simmer this while you get your berries ready to go in

Add 12 cups saskatoons

1/2 cup white sugar mixed with your pectin

1 box of no sugar Pectin

Stir up and get to boiling, stirring constantly for 1 minute or so.

Add 2 1/2 cups white sugar, stirring and reducing heat.

Taste it, add more sugar if you need, more berries if you want even.  It is not rocket science.  Flavors blend more as it sits.

Place in hot jars, fill with hot jam, clean jar rim, place hot lid on hot jar.  Set aside on a towel and wait for the POP POP POP.  Label and store.  I leave mine on the counter for 24 hours to make sure they have sealed before I take them to the root cellar.

Notice I say HOT a lot ~ it is important to have everything hot, it sterilizes and seals your food.

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