Long period between eggs hatching?

[Dschickchicks]

Hey y’all,
This is my first time successfully incubating. I started with 7 viable eggs. While candling I accidentally cracked one egg (I felt horrible, it was a total accident) so I had 6 eggs total incubating. I’m incubating Buff Orpington eggs from my existing flock. My temps and humidity have been good, and the air cells looked good as well. My incubator reached day 1 in the the countdown on Wednesday the 12th. The first two eggs pipped late that night. The first egg hatched at 11am Thursday. The second egg hatched at 5pm Thursday. I just woke up (5am Friday) and a third egg has pipped. From what I understand the first hatched chick would start needing food and water at 11am today since that would be 24 hours post hatch? Why are my eggs hatching so far apart? At what point do I give up on the other eggs and open it to put my chicks in the brooder? I don’t want to open it and end up shrink wrapping the other eggs but I especially don’t want to risk my already hatched chicks either.

 

[igorsMistress]

Hey y’all,
This is my first time successfully incubating. I started with 7 viable eggs. While candling I accidentally cracked one egg (I felt horrible, it was a total accident) so I had 6 eggs total incubating. I’m incubating Buff Orpington eggs from my existing flock. My temps and humidity have been good, and the air cells looked good as well. My incubator reached day 1 in the the countdown on Wednesday the 12th. The first two eggs pipped late that night. The first egg hatched at 11am Thursday. The second egg hatched at 5pm Thursday. I just woke up (5am Friday) and a third egg has pipped. From what I understand the first hatched chick would start needing food and water at 11am today since that would be 24 hours post hatch? Why are my eggs hatching so far apart? At what point do I give up on the other eggs and open it to put my chicks in the brooder? I don’t want to open it and end up shrink wrapping the other eggs but I especially don’t want to risk my already hatched chicks either.

Chicks can survive a couple of days after hatching without food, but you can move any that have hatched to the brooder when they are dry. Opening the incubator won’t hurt anything, even if the other eggs have pipped, so just work quickly and close it again. I usually wait until two or three days after hatch day before I toss the remaining eggs.

 

[Bigandlittles]

My last hatch had a late egg too. I was so nervous and didn’t want to open the incubator. My last egg finally hatched like 27 hours after the other ones. Be patient with them and see if anything changes today. Keep us posted. Wishing you the best. One thing I did was carefully without rotating it candles the last egg and saw movement so I knew that it was still alive and trying to do its thing. I’m not sure this is recommended but I did it and everything turned out ok.

 

[igorsMistress]

My last hatch had a late egg too. I was so nervous and didn’t want to open the incubator. My last egg finally hatched like 27 hours after the other ones. Be patient with them and see if anything changes today. Keep us posted. Wishing you the best. One thing I did was carefully without rotating it candles the last egg and saw movement so I knew that it was still alive and trying to do its thing. I’m not sure this is recommended but I did it and everything turned out ok.

I was just coming back to mention the candling

 

[Bigandlittles]

I was just coming back to mention the candling

I forgot who had mentioned that when I was panicking about my last egg. But they said to be careful not to estate and put it down the exact way it was.

 

[Dschickchicks]

I forgot who had mentioned that when I was panicking about my last egg. But they said to be careful not to estate and put it down the exact way it was.

Chicks can survive a couple of days after hatching without food, but you can move any that have hatched to the brooder when they are dry. Opening the incubator won’t hurt anything, even if the other eggs have pipped, so just work quickly and close it again. I usually wait until two or three days after hatch day before I toss the remaining eggs.

So quickly opening at this point won’t cause the membrane to shrink? If so I’ll pull the two chicks and put them in the brooder. Also the chicks that are in there are playing bumper eggs with the unhatched eggs. Is that an issue since when candling them they need to be placed back exactly how they were? Thank y’all for your help!

 

[igorsMistress]

So quickly opening at this point won’t cause the membrane to shrink? If so I’ll pull the two chicks and put them in the brooder. Also the chicks that are in there are playing bumper eggs with the unhatched eggs. Is that an issue since when candling them they need to be placed back exactly how they were? Thank y’all for your help!

I have read that bumper egg games can be a problem, but I’ve always removed chicks when dry so the little bit mine got didn’t seem to have an impact. It will not hurt anything if you open the incubator, just be quick about it. Don’t worry about cleaning or putting the eggs back exactly etc, just take out the hatchlings and you can clean up later. At this point you don’t know which side was up before the egg got bumped.

 

[Dschickchicks]

Awesome, thank you so much!

 

[igorsMistress]

Awesome, thank you so much!

My pleasure. We need pics of the chicks

 

[Dschickchicks]

My pleasure. We need pics of the chicks

Once everyone is hatched out and together in the brooder I’ll take a group pic!