Naliez
Songster
- May 7, 2015
- 822
- 155
- 138
I had a (2nd) failed batch of shipped Serama eggs that I didn't think made it. The few that HAD development, quit before lockdown, but I put the hopefuls in anyway. After a couple days and no real miracle, I'm getting ready to clean out the incubator when I hear peeping. One had pipped internally and then for 10 hours was peeping. I poked a hole to see in the air pocket (that was already too small) and he looked like he pipped way too low and was drowning and maybe bleeding into the shell. I peeled back just enough shell around his beak to get some air, dabbed away the fluid, then propped the egg up so fluid wouldn't drain into his mouth and I left him that way over night.
My last batch (and my first hatch ever), I ended up with an assisted hatch "special needs" chick, who spent the entire day and night PEEPING LOUDLY nonstop and who, despite syringe feeding every couple of hours and round the clock extra TLC taken in shifts by each sleep deprived and frazzled family member, passed anyway 4 days later to our dismay and since then, I (we) have decided from NOW on, to let nature take it's course. Yes! Only the strong survive around here! We're learning to be hard-core farmers here; no room for obvious "culls". Well, this morning, I have this....
But honestly he looks kinda bad. My 7 year old looks in and starts yelling "Yay! He made it!"
I look in at this pathetic, half slimy, half crusty, on his back shaking and peeping lonely little Serama chick. I mean, yes, he made it out on his own and is making a lot of noise, but he has this big, squishy, purplish-looking abdomen and he's just kind of laying there on his back. Ok, so maybe we'll be hard-core farmers tomorrow. Some of the membrane had dried hard over his face and eyes, so I gently washed him off with a q-tip. He has more ease of movement with the dried membrane gone, but the abdomen bothers me. I looked it up, and I have 5 four-day-old Silkies in a brooder, but if this guy has some kind of bacterial infection, that isn't something I want to pass on to the others. Is he going to die? Can they make it past "mushy chick"? Or does he even have it at all? His umbilical cord looks dried and sealed. (It's a dried white thing hanging off his belly.) The yoke has been completely absorbed and there is no open area or bleeding at all. He's not opening his eyes and he's on his back with legs and wings splayed out and quivering. BUT... he IS kicking a lot, and crying, so not completely weak. It's just that after our last fiasco; with the ups and downs of hatching your first eggs, I'm really just hoping for him to go quickly in one direction or the other. I feel like I'm still too new at this for "culling", but if I have an ill chicken who can infect the rest of little ones, I'm going to have to put my feelings aside really fast.
My last batch (and my first hatch ever), I ended up with an assisted hatch "special needs" chick, who spent the entire day and night PEEPING LOUDLY nonstop and who, despite syringe feeding every couple of hours and round the clock extra TLC taken in shifts by each sleep deprived and frazzled family member, passed anyway 4 days later to our dismay and since then, I (we) have decided from NOW on, to let nature take it's course. Yes! Only the strong survive around here! We're learning to be hard-core farmers here; no room for obvious "culls". Well, this morning, I have this....
But honestly he looks kinda bad. My 7 year old looks in and starts yelling "Yay! He made it!"
I look in at this pathetic, half slimy, half crusty, on his back shaking and peeping lonely little Serama chick. I mean, yes, he made it out on his own and is making a lot of noise, but he has this big, squishy, purplish-looking abdomen and he's just kind of laying there on his back. Ok, so maybe we'll be hard-core farmers tomorrow. Some of the membrane had dried hard over his face and eyes, so I gently washed him off with a q-tip. He has more ease of movement with the dried membrane gone, but the abdomen bothers me. I looked it up, and I have 5 four-day-old Silkies in a brooder, but if this guy has some kind of bacterial infection, that isn't something I want to pass on to the others. Is he going to die? Can they make it past "mushy chick"? Or does he even have it at all? His umbilical cord looks dried and sealed. (It's a dried white thing hanging off his belly.) The yoke has been completely absorbed and there is no open area or bleeding at all. He's not opening his eyes and he's on his back with legs and wings splayed out and quivering. BUT... he IS kicking a lot, and crying, so not completely weak. It's just that after our last fiasco; with the ups and downs of hatching your first eggs, I'm really just hoping for him to go quickly in one direction or the other. I feel like I'm still too new at this for "culling", but if I have an ill chicken who can infect the rest of little ones, I'm going to have to put my feelings aside really fast.
Last edited:
