2022/2023 Emu Hatch-a-Long

[ShannonsChimkens]

Are they wiggling today?

 

[ShannonsChimkens]

I just reread what was said… I need to stop skipping the meat of a post! Sorry. So are they wiggling today?

I’m all for letting the weak ones go, don’t get me wrong. But sometimes they just need a little air and light help. I have one now that’s two weeks old that should be dead. It was lifeless, eyes closed, no peeping and no way was it getting out of its egg. So I assisted once I was able to see that its yolk was absorbed. Once it was off the eggs supply of blood, it perked up and surprisingly survived.

 

[servpolice]

So last time I was home was the 25 of January and I took a week off from University because both males are due chick's from now until week Saturday (I'm going with natural incubation taking 55-56 days).

Ireland is blessed in having one of the driest February's on record!

So Vladimir is on day 52 today. I came home today and immediately checked the nests. Vladimir had one crushed egg, no idea when that happened. I also removed 4 eggs that had that water sound when shaking it gently. All exploded when discarded (I tap one with a stone and it was as if someone shot a gun). Never again will I break a water sounding emu egg close up again. And the smell!

Anyway Vladimir has 4 eggs left. In order to find out whether they were viable I did a 5 minute cool test next to the nest (making sure Vladimir didn't notice it). After 5 minutes 2 of the eggs remained nice and warm while 2 cooled down rapidly. I removed one of the cooled eggs and again, it exploded when I examined it. The other cooled egg I was unsure of so I put it back under Vladimir. The two eggs that remained warm both started twitching so they should hatch any day now!

 

[servpolice]

Nest 2 which is on day 49 had 9 eggs of which one had that water sound of a rotten egg but all the others seem viable. I did the cool test on 3 random eggs and all stayed warm (except where the air sac is of course) and two started moving! The second nest has potential for a lot of babies.

Overall, Vladimir eggs looked find, a bit dirty which was probably due to the one egg breakage. However, the second nest had all it's eggs in great condition, even the bad egg looked good.

The fertility from my second pair seems a lot better than the first pair, however, the first couple of eggs from the first pair were laid in freezing cold weather so that could've been a factor.

My plan is to leave my two males keep one baby each and I'll grab the rest.

Fingers crossed

 

[Sneakyturtle]

What would cause an emu chick to almost fully develop and then die? I ordered two hatching eggs with chance of blond/white, and one hatched (blonde). The other I broke the egg open at 60 days and it was dead (also blonde), but was almost fully formed and just had some of the yolk sac left to absorb. Out of 9 eggs I have bought this year, 7 of which were shipped, I have had 6 hatch, and 2 that never started developing, but this was the first one who developed and then stopped. It was also the smallest egg at 469 oz, so I’m wondering if that had something to do with it.

 

[servpolice]

So both nests hatched at the same time even though Vladimir had a 3 day head start!

Vladimir had both eggs hatch while I put the newest hatched chick's from the other male under Vladimir so that the male in nest 2 stays on his eggs without worrying about him leaving the nest to feed his babies. So far there are 6 chick's hatched and 3 of the 4 eggs left in nest 2 are all cheeping. The egg not cheeping I assume is the egg that was laid last which was 3 days after the second male started brooding!

Fingers crossed for 10 chick's!

 

[AlleysChicks]

1st time attempting to hatch emu eggs. Eggs came from eBay from 2 different breeders. Currently on day 9.

 

[Pyxis]

I did some whistle testing on two of the eggs that are due the 28th. Both moved! Hoping for a good hatch - and no power outage during this storm, darn it!

 

[Pyxis]

Did some whistling at some eggs tonight. Got some wiggles from a possible blonde egg. Had to pull another one though because it reeked At least I caught it before it leaked!

 

[Pyxis]

Pulled two chicks out of the incubator tonight, got a third egg whistling One little female is going to a home with a yearling male that needs a friend. Looks like two girls this time so far, which helps balance out all the boys I've been hatching! So many boys this year.