Issues with late embryo deaths

[bubbleberry]

I hatched 1 khaki out of 6 shipped eggs a couple of months ago, 4 of the eggs were deaths with only 2 days to go. I put this down to having damaged air cells.

Now I had 6 muscovy eggs from my own flock and it looks like, again, I'm only going to get one hatchling. I did have problems with the temps early on and lost 3 as a result but the other 3 have done fine since and now I've discovered 2 possibly dead and one looking fine and almost internally pipped.

What could be the cause of the deaths? My temp is 37.5-37.8 and humidity has been 20% up til now (dry hatch) egg weights and air cells all on point. Also turned 3 or 5 times daily.

 

[Amiga]

So this is relative humidity? Seems low to me, but I am not a hatcher. Have you seen the stickies on hatching?

@Lacrystol has some links on her signature that you may find useful as well.

 

[bubbleberry]

Yes relative humidity, I followed the post on hatching muscovy eggs (can't work out how to copy and paste on my phone) and the air cells look fine. Though I kept it at 40% humidity with the previous attempt and the exact same thing happened :/

 

[Amiga]

Some hatchers have found that the readings on the incubator itself are faulty - I am wondering if that might be the case, here.

 

[bubbleberry]

Possibly, I have a seperate thermometer/hygrometer but I will try calibrating it again after this last egg (hopefully) hatches.

 

[Lacrystol]

Ok you incubated them at 20%. That's perfect. Here's one reason it could be that they are dying off late in the game muskys are known for dehydration. So what I would do since you still have one left her a spray bottle and spray him see if that doesn't help.

Do u have a fan or no fan?? What's your humidity at lock down

 

[bubbleberry]

Ok, does that have to be spring/distilled water not from the tap? The cooling and misting is the one thing I haven't tried yet.

Day 35 is on monday but when I candled it last night the air cell had dipped. Also there is a lot of movement and I can see the beak starting to push on the edge of the air cell so I've stopped turning now and added some water. At the moment it's around 50% but I'll raise it to at least 60 when/if it pips. Just so frustrating having this happen again... Thanks for the help Amiga and Lacrystol!

 

[bubbleberry]

Oh and it's a fan incubator so that would dehydrate them more, right?

 

[Lacrystol]

Oh and it's a fan incubator so that would dehydrate them more, right?

If the air cell has dipped which I believe it has already need to get that humidity up. Should be at 60-65 right now and spray that egg water doesn't really matter if u have drinking water great use it. If you have tap use what u have.

 

[bubbleberry]

I think the duckling has died, the air cell has gone a funny shape and there's some yellowing around the bottom. I sprayed it and got the humidity up but it may have already gone at that point and it didn't make it to internal pip

I think one of my muscovys is going broody so I'll leave it to her for now and try again soon with the khaki eggs. I'll mist them frequently next time and see if I can get some good results. Thanks for all the help