Assisted hatching

[MishkaMash]

So I have two chicks that hatched and one well on its way, but there are still 4 more eggs to go and it is now 22 days since incubation and they're showing no signs or pips. Candling before lock down showed what it should.

How long do I leave them before they need help and what do I do?

 

[Egghead_Jr]

I leave eggs in for two days after first chick hatched. No pips or movement by then and they didn't make it. Toss eggs and start a new batch. Constant rotation of hatching here in the spring.

Any bird piped for 12 hours and no progress I assist. Usually these have stuck to shell and can't zip by themselves.

 

[MishkaMash]

I leave eggs in for two days after first chick hatched. No pips or movement by then and they didn't make it. Toss eggs and start a new batch. Constant rotation of hatching here in the spring.

Any bird piped for 12 hours and no progress I assist. Usually these have stuck to shell and can't zip by themselves. 

Should I try to 'pip' into the air pocket of ones that havent hatched? How do I make sure they have actually passed? What if I hear peeping but still no pips? Its now been a day and a half since the first hatch; I have one that needs assisting, its got blood vessels still, but can breathe, so I was going to check it again in the am (its midnight here) and assist further if needed.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Did you add an egg later in the incubation? To still have blood vessels when others of batch hatched seems off. Homemade incubator with varying temperature (cold pockets) maybe?

The chick should be able to pip it's own shell. I only assist if the chick is stuck and that wouldn't happen unless they already pipped the shell. Leave it alone and wait and see. There may be cold pockets in incubator and why one chick is so far behind in development.

 

[Pyxis]

I've done safety holes made very carefully in the top of the air cell with very valuable eggs that I'm afraid of losing. I only do this after candling to ascertain that they are indeed internally pipped. Most then proceed to pip and zip on their own, but there have been some that were malpositioned (such as the feet over head position) so that they couldn't externally pip and actually would have died had I not intervened. This is rare though.

I wouldn't immediately jump to that being the reason yours are late. Other things first: how has your incubator temp been throughout incubation? Do you have still air or forced? Could there have been cold spots that slowed development or hot spots that sped it up for the already hatched chicks? Have you candled to check that they are still alive or to see if they have internally pipped? They may have died in late incubation. Which brings me to another question, how was your humidity? Late incubation death is usually caused by the humidity not being right, so if they did die, you might want to take a look at that as a possible cause.

All that said, I have had chicks hatch as late as 25 days before. You may just need to wait. Also, what was the date that you set them on?