Can humidity be too high during hatch?

[Gypsy07]

What day are you on now?

 

[hmlongino]

It's only day 22... so I'm haven't given up yet, but the first ones started hatching Wednesday night (day 19) and no one has hatched since yesterday evening (day 21). 12 are out... 15 with no pips or anything.

I am giving them a couple more days, though... but it does worry me not to see anything, or hear anything, at all.

I just wish I knew exactly what was up!

 

[Gypsy07]

If they're all the same breed and from the same source, I'd imagine your hatch is probably done, with the ones that didn't make it maybe having fallen victim to high temps throughout the hatch (as they started hatching on day 19 I'd suspect consistent slightly high temps or a couple of temp spikes that may have been hotter in some parts of the bator than others). If they're different breeds and/or from different sources then there's every chance you'll still get a few more out. Have you tried float testing them to see if anyone's wriggling around inside their shell?

 

[hmlongino]

Ha! Much to my surprise, one is zipping NOW!

None of the others even have a pip, but I'm just going to leave them be until the morning before I check 'em out.

If he/she's alive in there, maybe some others are, too!

 

[hmlongino]

Okay, so what if the air cell is nice and big in there, but the chick is unpipped and dead, fully formed? All 14 remaining were in a lot of liquid, with a large air cell. I eggtopsied them and could open them at the air cell and look down in to the membrane below.... tear it away and see the little guys in a bunch of wet goo.

36 eggs put in.
27 made it to lockdown (viable on day 18)
they started hatching on day 19 and done by 20... the rest (14) had died sometime during lockdown.

If some hatching began well before others had even pipped, and the humidity rose on them pre-pipping, could they have drowned after lockdown?

It seems unlikely that my humidity was wrong the whole time and we had 13 hatch out alright.

I would love expert opinions, as I am confused and upset and want to learn.

 

[misslady]

I'm not an expert, but I don't think they can drown unless they break into their air cells. If the membrane inside the egg was intact and the chick hadn't poked it's beak into the air cell, I don't think the cause of death could be drowning. I believe gypsy07 posted that earlier, (correct me if I'm wrong) and I am sure they know their hatching stuff more than I do.

What was your humidity at during incubation before you locked down?

So sorry for your loss by the way. I had one that mysteriously died during lockdown on my last set of eggs. I kind of wondered what happened there too.

 

[1234duck]

So sorry for your loss, that really sucks. I've had that happen too but not with as many eggs as you. Sounds like for sure they didnt finish absorbing the yolk. ~ Just because all the eggs dont pip and hatch all at the same time/same day dont be quick to toss them.

~Julie

 

[Gypsy07]

Quote:
Sounds like they could have died just before lockdown started. Chicks are pretty much fully grown and look fully developed from about day 17/18, but their bones still have to kind of 'harden up' some (don't know a better way of explaining it than that - they're full sized but they're still kind of soft) and they have to absorb their yolk. But apart from that, they can look fully developed. Death at this point can be due to a number of things - non-ideal humidity, non-ideal temperature, bacterial contamination (which btw doesn't always manifest as stinky black gunk - your dead chicks could look perfect yet still have fallen victim to some form of bacteria), vitamin deficiency in the parent stock, general poor health in the parent stock, the list goes on and on. A little liquid is normal at this point, but if it's a lot, I'd wonder about humidity levels...

What about the ones that did hatch out okay - was there any liquid in any of their shells?

Quote:
You still haven't said (at least I don't think you have) if these were all the one breed, or several different breeds, and whether they were shipped or not. If they were shipped, you've actually had quite a good hatch, by most people's way of thinking anyway. My last two experiences with shipped eggs, I hatched 3 out of 18 and 4 out of 15...

Quote:
No. In a word, just NO. Please trust me on this point. If they drowned, it was because of a too-high humidity throughout the first part of the incubation, not because of a too-high humidity for one day near the end. Anyway, if they hadn't pipped into the air cell, they didn't drown. And even if they had pipped into the air cell, if the humidity had been ideal up to that point, I'm fairly sure that the only way they could ever drown after that would be if you subjected them to 100% humidity, i.e. submerged them in water!

Quote:
Well, chicks are tough. So it IS actually entirely possible that your humidity was too high for some of them, but just not so high that it killed all of them. I'm not saying that's what happened here, just that it IS something that COULD happen. And if they were different breeds, it's even more likely.

 

[hmlongino]

Wow! Thank you so much for your thorough post!

Sorry-- definitely lacking in my info!

They were not shipped.... I drove to pick them up. 14 were orpingtons and 22 were marans. From that 5 orpingtons hatched and 8 marans. I candled and saw them moving on day 18, humidity throughout hatch was about 40-45%. Typical air cells throughout hatch, as well.

 

[Gypsy07]

Well, it doesn't sound like your humidity was anything unusual. I incubate at 45% myself which just about always gets me to the correct moisture loss by day 18. Also you didn't have any odd hatching results like all your Orps hatching but none of your Marans. Percentage wise, both breeds had almost the exact same hatch result, at 35-36%. It always helps to know these things

I wonder if the age of the eggs could perhaps be something to do with it? Do you know how many hens of each breed were kept at the place you got your eggs from? Like, if there was a flock of 20+ Marans you could be reasonably confident all your eggs were probably less than 3 days old. But if there were only four or five of them, and if perhaps they weren't the best layers, some of your eggs might have been over a week old by the time you set them. Just a thought...

Another thought is bacterial contamination. I've done a bit of experimenting with incubator and egg cleanliness, and I've found that at the end of staggered hatches when the incubator is full of previous hatches' gunk and debris, I get a much higher amount of fully developed but not internally pipped dead-in-shell chicks than I'd normally expect with a straightforward hatch where all the eggs are set at the one time. Conversely, when I started washing all my hatching eggs in a dilute bleach solution, the number of late term DIS chicks I was getting went right down. I've experimented with washed versus unwashed eggs from the same pair of birds in the same incubator at the same time, and the washed ones always have a better hatch result. Specifically, with fewer late term fully developed DIS chicks. Washing eggs doesn't seem to change the small percentage of blood rings or early quitters that I get, but it does seem to have reduced the ones that nearly make it to the end and then quit last minute. Maybe something else worth thinking about.

Are your hatched chicks strong and healthy looking?