HELP - Incubating Shipped Coturnix Eggs

[cosmosue]

I’ve opened it when I have to, to remove batches of chicks seeming to do more harm then good when there is a lot of them.

I would give it another day or two and check to see if any are pipped if you can.

I incubate around 55% humidity and hatch at higher, I had a huge hatch June 25th of 93%. I did open it a few times quickly to remove batches and the eggs were not affected the ones that did not make it had never pipped at all. Ones that were pipped when I had to open also hatched fine. You have to be quick about it when you have to do it. The humidity will go back up.

 

[WVduckchick]

Opening the incubator is not an immediate death sentence. If you need to, then do it.

If you didn't set the eggs until the morning of the 14th, you are really only on day 19, which is not out of the question for quail eggs. Day 1 doesn't start until 24 hours after setting.
Give them some time.

Aslo with the Maxi, and a good bright flashlight, you may be able to candle without opening the incubator. I know quail eggs are more difficult, but look for the air cell to see if its drawn down, at least. You may be able to make out internal pips too. And shine from every direction. Quail eggs are hard to see pips sometimes, with all the speckles!

Good luck!!

 

[cosmosue]

Yes everything the above person has said is correct.

Also to look for pips try shining a light on the sides ok this is hard to explain.

What I mean is look for cracks so the light would catch a crack if it were raised even slightly you would see a white line indicating a crack/pip it would be very slightly raised. Other pips are of course way more evident.

But if you shine the light around the egg not directly at it, but around the sides so the light would “catch” on any crack sometimes I can see pips this way when looking straight down they are invisible.

Hope we have helped! And the poster above is right - 24 hours counts as day one, I’ve had some be very late due to that hen I had sitting on them, I would say they didn’t all hatch until day 23 some earlier. But they are fine young adults now.

 

[Bates]

Thank you for the great advice. I did wonder if I had miscalculated the days. If that's the case then I hope going in to lockdown a day early didn't do any harm.

I've been looking over the eggs with a torch to see but can't see any obvious pips. There are some uneven textures on some of the eggs, but I think they were already there. It's very difficult to tell.

I appreciate you all taking the time to respond. It's put me a little more at ease. I'll give the eggs until the weekend. Hopefully I can come back with a positive update before then.

 

[cosmosue]

Going to lockdown a bit early won’t hurt like my 5 that I had no clue about and they were fine. I’m not saying it will always be that way but from my experience these guys are pretty hardy and just a bit of being “off” isn’t usually going to kill them.

Let us know what happens

 

[Bates]

I've just come home from work today and had a inspection. It didn't look like anything was happening so I occupied myself with some other things. I've just had a second look and one of the eggs has a little bit of shell underneath and is wobbling - my first quail pip! I'm so happy!

I'll see how it goes, but will share some pictures once it's hatched. Hopefully the others will follow suit. Thanks again for the reassurance.

 

[AlderCreekFarms]

I bought some Coturnix quail eggs a few weeks ago and have been incubating them with a Brinsea Maxi II Advance. It’s the 20th day and there’s been no progression. What should I do? Here is the timeline:

June 13th - I collected the eggs from the post office. They weren’t packed very well and I ended up with 27 / 48 eggs (56%) after removing the breakages. I let these sit overnight (12 hours) and placed them in the incubator the following morning.

June 14th (Day 1) - After doing a lot of research, I thought I’d try dry incubation as this seemed to be the most successful. I let the shipped eggs sit in their carton for 3-5 days so that the air sac could settle and reattach. There was no turning during this time and the incubator was set at 37.5C (99.5F) with 45% RH humidity. There was a power cut for a couple of hours between this date and day 5.

June 18th (Day 5) - I set the eggs in the turning tray and activated the automatic turning.

June 23rd (Day 10) - I candled the eggs and removed a couple of eggs that I had missed with fractured hairlines. They didn’t look like they had developed and I didn’t want to risk the spread of bacteria. There were some eggs I was unsure of so I kept these in the incubator incase.

June 27th (Day 14) - LOCKDOWN - I candled the eggs again and started removing some that looked empty. They were not full or dark like you’d expect at this point. I cracked open the first egg and was mortified to find a developed embryo (cirka. day 9, without feathers) that was still alive. I felt really awful about this and after culling the embryo I ended up putting the “uncertain” eggs back in the incubator. There were two that were definately empty (I checked) so these were removed. The humidity in the incubator was increased to 65%. I removed the turning tray and replaced it with a non-slip, cardboard mat.

I haven’t opened the incubator since and have been eagerly checking the eggs each day. There hasn’t really been any movement (thought I saw an egg wobble once or twice) or pipping. I’m getting a bit desperate and have tried encouraging them with quail sounds on YouTube.

It’s now day 20 and I’m wondering what I should do next. I have read they can hatch as late as day 21, but should I give them a little longer (i.e. 25 days)? I’m feeling disappointed at the moment, but trying to stay positive. I think there have been a lot of factors (as named above) that have influenced the outcome…

I’d welcome any advice or support at the moment. Thank you.

 

[AlderCreekFarms]

I've just come home from work today and had a inspection. It didn't look like anything was happening so I occupied myself with some other things. I've just had a second look and one of the eggs has a little bit of shell underneath and is wobbling - my first quail pip! I'm so happy!

I'll see how it goes, but will share some pictures once it's hatched. Hopefully the others will follow suit. Thanks again for the reassurance.

 

[cosmosue]

Yay!!! Let us know!

 

[Bates]

So I'm up to three pips at the moment. They all started last night. I've read they should take 12-24 hours from first pip. Is that right? I'm worried they might be stop in the shell.