Chick mostly hatched but shell stuck to its back... what do we do?

[jaslyman]

Good morning. We are hatching chicks for the very first time. Of our batch of 5, 2 are out and looking good. One is mostly out, but has a large section of shell stuck to her(?) back. With stimulus (light) she exhibits bursts of energy (cheeps, kicking legs), but is otherwise still with eyes closed. Today is day 23. Do we just wait it out?

 

[jaslyman]

to add some additional information... the unzipping started yesterday mid-afternoon, about 18 hours ago

 

[cmom]

A little warm water should soften it enough to get the shell unstuck.

 

[jaslyman]

A little warm water should soften it enough to get the shell unstuck.

thank you! as you can see in the photo, we have another that's mostly unzipped and will hopefully hatch this AM. Should we wait that out a bit before opening the incubator to wet the shell, or go ahead and deal with it now, do you think?

 

[cmom]

I would help it out of it's shell and let it rest a bit and then take a little warm water. You can use a Q-tip moisten and swab it on and around the piece of shell. I have had that happen in the past.

 

[cmom]

If you open the incubator and take the chick out and if you have a mister, you can mist the remaining eggs which will help them so they won't get stuck in their shells and will bring the humidity back up almost immediately.

 

[jaslyman]

If you open the incubator and take the chick out and if you have a mister, you can mist the remaining eggs which will help them so they won't get stuck in their shells and will bring the humidity back up almost immediately.

Thank you - the humidity has been REALLY high in the past 24 hours... around 90%, and that's with me trying to remove most of the sitting water in the external reservoir. I assume that high humidity is a natural result of all the eggs hatching but I was curious if was possibly causing problems.

 

[cmom]

Yes when the chicks hatch the humidity will go up some.