Blood ring? Still alive?!

[thomp119]

Hello,

Today was day 5 of incubation... and I had a huge temp spike to 105 today. I decided to candle early and saw that one of my eggs was fine... the other had a HUGE and THICK blood ring in it. I felt that it was dead and decided to crack it open. BIG MISTAKE!!! The poor thing was alive and I saw the TINIEST micro heart beat ever... and slowly saw it fade out and stop. I feel terrible! I wish I could have glued it back into its shell. Next time I am going to leave them in incubator if it has a blood ring....

 

[speckledhen]

Then what you saw was not an actual blood ring, which only forms when the peep has deceased and the blood has moved out of the vessels to pool in a ring. You probably saw the center vein that sometimes goes around the circumference of the egg--the vessels radiate down from the air cell to that area and sometimes you can mistake it for a blood ring. Day Five is too early to be sure of what you're seeing, trust me! Never remove one till after Day 10, to avoid mistakes, no matter what you see, unless it smells bad.

 

[Illia]

I've made a mistake like that too. . . And now I know better. Except, I culled it around day 10 or later. It had a big, thick, red ring all the way around the equator of the egg, but the chick was pretty decently developed. I didn't see signs of life though, but was pretty sure blood rings do not develop that late in incubation.

Now I always make sure that if I see a "blood ring" - I wait almost a week, and if there is NO development, I cull it.