Day 21 and only 1 pip and now nothing. What should I do?

[gwendalynn28]

I have 7 eggs set in a Little Giant incubator. Things have gone really great all throughout the incubation. The temp has been a steady 99-100 degrees and the humidity has been around 40-45%. I candled right before lockdown it looked like 6 of the 7 eggs are gonna hatch. Today is hatch day. This morning around 9:30am the first egg pipped. Its now almost 8pm eastern time and nothing else has happened. The humidity has been at 65% all during lockdown and the temp is a perfect 99 degrees. Maybe I'm just really impatient but it seems like something should have happened by now. I'm starting to worry myself. I'm not going to interfere though. My last hatch had only one survivor and I had to get that one out of the shell myself and I have vowed to let nature take its course this time. Should I just continue to just check in occasionally? I have heard that some chicks take as long as 25 days to hatch. I'm worrying because I haven't seen movement on the one pip since about 12:30pm. Help!!!!

 

[Sphinx]

Is your little giant a still air or forced air? If it's still air, that's a bit low on temp, and they may be a bit late to hatch. If it's forced air, it seems fine.


I know that a lot of people here seem to have their chicks hatch early, and mine never do that.

The hatch that just ended for me today had 5 chicks hatch in the last half of the 21st day, and they were pipped a good 12-24 hours. The straggler hatched halfway through the 22nd day.

 

[gwendalynn28]

I have a forced air incubator. Today is day 21 and I expected them to hatch during the day today but I guess they have other plans. I'm just worried because day 21 is almost over and I can't see pips on any of the other eggs and the one that has pipped has done nothing more to try to get out of its egg. I'm going to keep watching and waiting for know. I guess I can start worrying if they don't hatch out by the end of tomorrow! Its so hard just waiting though!!! I really don't want to "assist". I'm worried I may do more harm than good.

 

[KLRA]

There might be pips on the undersides of the eggs. And sometimes the pips are more like little hairline cracks--almost impossible to see. There's nothing you can do to help them along if they haven't pipped yet. Just sit tight!

 

[AinaWGSD]

Sit tight and let them do their thing! It can take a really long time from pip to zip. I just finished my first hatch in a Little Giant still air incubator, and the first egg we noticed had pipped took about 24 hours to hatch. It had pipped Sunday evening when we checked the eggs at 7:30pm. By 5:15pm on Monday evening, several other eggs had hatched out completely, but the pip in that first egg honestly didn't look any bigger at all. When I went in to check again at 8:15, he had just completely hatched.

 

[InsaneChicken]

Yesterday I had one that pipped and it hadn't move or done anything else the whole entire day so I was worried for a bit too. But late last night she started peeping and was out of her shell in 30 minutes! I just barely got to see her hatching. So like the other person said.. Just let em do their thing

 

[teckkev]

I done 2 small batches this season.

1) 6 eggs - 4 hatched with no problems. 1 did nothing. 1 made a pin hole, but never made it pass the pin hole.

2) 10 eggs - 5 hatched with no problems. 1 made a pin hole but never done anything else. It was getting close to the 48 time period of pin hole, so I helped it out and it is doing great. Remaining 4 done nothing. Note on this batch: the wafer thermostat got bumped taking the turner out. Instead of 99.6 (Forced Air) it was 96.9 for 24 hours when I discovered the error. I was quite happy to see that any hatched.

I still have the same question as poster: what can cause the egg to peep but nothing else? My incubator settings are accurate as can be. My meter that measures temp and humidity is with the eggs on the bottom.

I have Hovabator/Little Giant.

Thanks,
Kevin

 

[gwendalynn28]

So this is my incubator all day yesterday. Just that one little pip and no more action. I mean nothing, not a peeping sound, not a wobbling egg, nothing.
So after biting my nails all day I decide to go to bed. I wake up at 4:30am this morning because I can't stand it any longer and this is what I find!

I know have one hatched chick and a pip on a second egg. This is day 22 so I hope they all come on out today! It seems to be going pretty slow. I am still hoping for six healthy chicks! Keep your fingers crossed! I will keep sending updates and pictures as the hatch progresses! Thanks for the tips everyone! Sitting on my hands is probably the hardest part of raising chickens! I am so happy to see this first chick though and its so pretty! It has a lot of color! Its hard to tell from the photo, I know, but its dim in the living room this morning and I didn't want to scare the poor chick with the flash on the camera!

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Looking good. Congratulations.

Two things that can cause a later hatch are:

1) Older eggs; storing past day 10 the eggs can take a day longer to hatch.
2) Slightly low incubating temperature; use same thermometer and raise temp 1 degree next time.

 

[gwendalynn28]

I actually had two thermometers in the incubator! One is an old fashioned mercury one and the other a digital with a built in hygrometer as well. Both were reading 99-100 degrees. I collected the eggs over a seven day period though and even put another in on the next day that was fresh! My husband called about an hour ago and said that chick number 2 has hatched out as well!! There's no telling how many will hatch before I can get home!! It always happens when I'm not looking! I'm sure the kids are having a good time watching the chicks hatch out though!