Accomodating Small Eggs at Hatch/Lockdown?

[Quispherer]

Hey there general BYC incubating forum! I'm usually exclusively in the quail forum but would love to get as much wisdom as possible from all kinds of hatchers I have some smaller than normal BobWhite Quail eggs that I assumed wouldn't develop but absolutely are. Wondering if I should do anything to make it more likely for them to survive? I had a major issue with malpositioned chicks in a hatch 2 weeks ago so I'm kind of anxious about the same happening here and losing the majority of the chicks at hatch. Early quitters I can handle, even embryo deaths, but fully formed chicks dying at hatch hurts my heart

My understanding is they incubate almost exactly the same as chickens, tending to hatch out between day 21-23, so chicken people please feel free to advise.

So long version: I got my eggs 2 weeks or so ago, and did my usual procedure for shipped eggs, candle for damage and wonky air cells, set them in the incubator for 3 days before starting the turner. I'm trying to be hands off as much as possible but candling absolutely fascinates me so I've checked them 3 or 4 times over their first 15 days, which is where we are now.

Pictured above is one normal egg and two small eggs, all developing perfectly on schedule. They are sitting in quail sized egg turners and still look tiny

That's one of the small ones between my thumb and index finger, looking beautiful and showing movement.

And a normal egg showing a similar air cell and same level of development, just like.. normal size haha. You can see it is both larger and more rounded, seemingly giving the chick more space? Pretty cool that the yolk is visible, with pics like these how could I not be obsessed with candling

But anyway.

Since my disaster hatch, I've started upping the humidity by 5%-8% the last week and stopping the turner 5 days before hatch instead of the usual 3, both of these are in an effort to make sure the chicks can position themselves properly. It worked for my Valley Quail, which are also prone to malpositioning so I feel like this helped?

Would the smaller eggs benefit from not turning at this point? Is there any real detriment to not turning once the chicks skin is formed? From what I've read they're far enough developed, there's no real need to turn them as theres no longer a risk of the skin and membrane forming improperly together. But I know turning until 3 days before hatch is kind of the way its always been done and everyone recommends doing it that way, so surely everyone does it for a reason?

Would love any advice from others who have hatched extra small eggs. Not quite fairy eggs since clearly they must have yolks haha, but small enough.

Thanks a ton BYC peoples

 

[Debbie292d]

I will say that I do a 5-day lockdown as I've had silkies pip as early as 18 days. No idea why some are such early birds as the rest hatched on day 19, as many times silkies will do. I've hatched over 500 chicks this year, and overwhelmingly, they pipped on the 19th or 20th day, and were all done hatching by the 21st day.

I could do a 7-day lockdown if I cared to, because the last trimester of their incubation, they are much more mobile and would never get stuck to the side of their egg. I've never seen any of them hatch and be "sticking" to their shells, although, we've all seen a bit of broken shell stuck to them, which is unrelated to turning.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

In general, undersized eggs don’t need any different treatment. They all need the same humidity, temperature and turning treatment. In my experience, females hatched from those eggs tend to lay undersized eggs.

I agree that stopping turning near the end isn’t a problem. The turning problem is waiting 3 days to start turning. It is advisable to let the shipped eggs settle 6 or 8 hours but beyond that, the effects will be negative.

There are many incubation problems related to fully developed embryo death. You will probably get some suggestions there but in my opinion late death is sometimes caused by something that happens even before collection or even lay. Enhanced breeder nutrition will put the vitamins, minerals and amino acids into the egg that will give them the vigor to go to hatching and beyond.