Between Family Synchronization of Hatching Time in Bobwhite Quail

Abstract

VINCE (1964) reported that the embryo in a single Bobwhite quail egg, laid at the midpoint of a two-week production period and placed in an incubator with other eggs laid during the same period but already incubated for a period of twenty-four hours, tended to synchronize its hatching time with that of its sibs when the eggs were in contact with one another. Later, Vince (1966) found that the direct application of artificial stimulation either in the form of vibration or a “clicking” sound to an individual Bobwhite egg during incubation induced the embryo contained therein to hatch ahead of its siblings which had been incubated for the same period of time but had not been subjected to the artificial stimulation.In the hatching of pedigreed Bobwhite quail (Colinus virginianus) eggs it was noted that embryos from the eggs of one family consistently hatched as much as twenty-four hours or…