Question about silkie eggs and humidity???

[bHen]

Ok this was my second batch of eggs to incubate. I had silkie eggs, black copper marans, blue splash marans, and BLRW.

The mutt eggs came almost two days early. They literally jumped out of the shells and took off running!

I have had one BCM hatch and is doing great. There are others piping.

Silkies... not so good. Two pipped and one I had to help out. The rest of the silkies never even pipped. I opened them and all of the chicks inside were fully formed and dead! Are you suppose to incubate silkie eggs differently than other eggs???

Blue splash Marans not so good either... many are pipping, 2 are out with sprattle legs, and 1 was stuck to its shell a little.

BLRW not even a pip...

The only thing I did differently was I had too many eggs to fit my turner so I was in and out of the bator to turn freq. It is a home made foam bator that fluctuates humidity between 40-50%. My first hatch by the way was almost 100% with strong chicks.

Here are my questions:
1) Should I incubate silkie eggs differently?
2) What causes sprattle legs?
3) Did humidity cause sticky chick and sprattle legs?

Any input would be greatly appreciated!

 

[rebelcowboysnb]

I think your humidity may be a little high the first 18 an low the last 3 but without seeing the eggs that didnt hatch I'm guessing. The smaller eggs are harder to hatch. If your getting good hatches with the bigger eggs then I would just tweek my humidity a little an try again...

Im still lost as to what causes sprattle legs but I think it has something to do with the chick having a hard time hatching.

 

[bHen]

Thanks for the input! I kind of thought that about the smaller ones not being able to loose as much 'fluid' since they don't have as much to loose to begin with... Anyone else? I am especially curious about the spattle legs now because 2 have it really bad
Also, I have noticed they seem to have really big feet. And two had the yolks unabsorbed...