How long after fetal death will vasculature remain?

This is my first time using an incubator for poultry and im so nervous.. My first lockdown started today and while it's only two eggs both have lots of veins and appropriate size dark spots and air pockets..

My question is how long after death does of take for the veins to degrade? I don't know how else to "learn" my incubator without being able to assess problems as they arise and wanted to know for future clutches.. This test was small and I want to try a larger batch soon.

Basically since they rely on rot to degrade often the egg will simply become darker and darker like it's developing as the yolk begins to rot around the veins, and this will be obscuring the veins, so you won't see them rot. If you're not experienced enough it will look like development, in most cases. In my experience anyway.

How fast this happens depends on what's killed the embryo. If it's bacterial it may appear to develop/darken much faster than usual and that's a sign of rotting.

Best wishes.

One was fully feathered and looked like day 18-19 on the chart. The other was basically greenish black chowder.. Based on size of the clumps I think day 14ish..

Today I have two of four piping that technically should hatch tomorrow..so I hope my not lifting the lid to candle incessantly is working now and I can actually set more than a handful at a time.

Well, I'm not sure what's gone on there but it does sound pretty normal, DIS and rotten eggs do occur pretty often in the average clutch. Hopefully you get some live AND healthy ones out of this. I think there's a good chance.

Best wishes.

chooks4life said:

Well, I'm not sure what's gone on there but it does sound pretty normal, DIS and rotten eggs do occur pretty often in the average clutch. Hopefully you get some live AND healthy ones out of this. I think there's a good chance.

Best wishes.

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I think I over candled them. The next 7 out of 7 all hatched with only one crooked foot. I did a major "no no" and added eggs a week after the first two when I started thinking maybe just two didn't give me a chance for good odds. I did throw out two that never developed, but all the ones that started have hatched since I lost those first two and started only turning.

Cherie1n2 said:

I think I over candled them. The next 7 out of 7 all hatched with only one crooked foot. I did a major "no no" and added eggs a week after the first two when I started thinking maybe just two didn't give me a chance for good odds. I did throw out two that never developed, but all the ones that started have hatched since I lost those first two and started only turning.

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Unless you werew candling multiple times a day or were handling them with dirty hands or roughly, I would not blame candling. When done right candling can be done on a regular basis. I've always spot checked by candling every night during the first 17 days. I got tired of hearing people tell other people candling was harmful and would compromise the hatch so the last hatch I designated 6 (out of 21 eggs) for candling and picture taking every single night from day1-18. The other eggs I would candle day 7/14/18. I only lost one egg for the whole hatch and that was one of the eggs I was NOT candling regulalrly and it quite before day 5. The other 20 hatched happy and healthy and are growing quickly (7 weeks old). But I wash my hands before handling and am gentle with them.

I think staggered hatches are much more likely to decrease hatch rates than candling. There are so many things that can compromise a hatch that sometimes it is hard to pinpoint just why a hatch or certain eggs failed.

I'm not saying everyone should be candling addicts, I highly believe hatchers should stay within their comfort zone and if that is not candling than that's what they should do, but I hate to see people confine themselves to limits that were set by others w/o experiencing things for themselves.

Oh I was definitely candling multiple times a day at first because I would read about something different and then want to go try it. The eggs I was using were my own off my lavender ameraucana and any of my 12 hens and I have many many animals (reptiles and ferrets) that would gladly eat a dead or deformed chick so my goal was in figuring things out and not necessarily doing things exactly right. My origional question about the vasculature was so I could go ahead and open eggs as soon as fetal death was suspected and not wait until they were fully rotted. I know that sounds horrible to some people, but I have to be honest with myself. I have a lot of breeding projects to start soon and would rather go through a few learning curves now than later when Im working with low egg producing breeds.

Cherie1n2 said:

Oh I was definitely candling multiple times a day at first because I would read about something different and then want to go try it. The eggs I was using were my own off my lavender ameraucana and any of my 12 hens and I have many many animals (reptiles and ferrets) that would gladly eat a dead or deformed chick so my goal was in figuring things out and not necessarily doing things exactly right. My origional question about the vasculature was so I could go ahead and open eggs as soon as fetal death was suspected and not wait until they were fully rotted. I know that sounds horrible to some people, but I have to be honest with myself. I have a lot of breeding projects to start soon and would rather go through a few learning curves now than later when Im working with low egg producing breeds.

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Then yes, that's possible. I get it. At least the part of the sooner the better. I have candled one night had a moving embryo and candle the next night to find a quitter and no veining, so I would think that once the blood stops flowing that degradation starts. In later deaths it takes days before rotting occurs if there is no bacterial cause of death. I have had chicks stop developing shortly after lockdown to hatch and when eggtopsied there were no "rotting", but nicely formed chicks in different stages. (Throughoutthe total of my hatches.) I think you get the early rotting predominately with death caused by bacterial invasion. That's my theory anyway.

Don't feel bad , I stick all my dead chicks and ones that die before or during hatching in the freezer for my boyfriends brother he has all kinds of reptiles. They now have a much more varied diet of rabbit chicken quail duck and pigeon. Waste not want not.

Halloweengirl13 said:

Don't feel bad , I stick all my dead chicks and ones that die before or during hatching in the freezer for my boyfriends brother he has all kinds of reptiles. They now have a much more varied diet of rabbit chicken quail duck and pigeon. Waste not want not.

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ferrets are prone to insulin tumors because they are strict carnivores. One side effect of insulin tumors in humans is behavior changes and hyperactivity. I get compliments on how unusually calm and friendly my ferret is. I feel like feeding him live mice and gerbils plays a large part in him being NICE.. Incidentally he won't eat or kill live chicks.. Only prekilled. He also won't eat processed raw chicken.