Can humidity be too high during hatch?

[designcreature]

I have found what works for me on a delayed hatch is the water method for testing for movement.

Take a container that will hold enough water that the egg will have to float on it's own. Fill the contain with very warm water, not boiling but pretty warm tap water.

Ease the egg into the water and give the water a chance to settle down. Watch and see if after a few seconds, the egg will begin to bobble. Or not. If there is active movement, then by all means return the egg to the incubator and give it extra time.

 

[MamaDucken]

My humidity is sitting at 85% right now. We have 19 days left before hatching. Are my babies going to be okay?!

 

[FlomatonsFlocks]

From my personal hatching experience, high humidity only drowns chicks if the humidity is high the first 18 days.  3 days of high humidity during lockdown should not drown the chicks. Matter of fact, the last hatch i had 6 of 8 eggs to hatch and humidity was over 80% during lockdown.  I would not worry about it, unless your humidity was high during the first 18 days.

Thank you. I was freaking out because my babies are wet and have pieces of egg shell on them and one even hatched with full yolk sac attached... Humidity is running 78 and three have hatched so far but I'm a nervous Nelly.

 

[SilkieLadee]

high humidity can make them hatch later...just give it time

 

[DIGGIN CHICKEN]

I don't see it (haven't done any reading on it)... but an egg by nature is a sealed enviroment filled with fluid .... how can they drown ??? The little air gap at the top is not a scuba tank of compressed air !!! a few little gulps of breath is all it will provide ... I'm sure the designer thought of better way ... babies get oxygen from the mothers blood after all!!

In the past i've realised that to much humidity is better than too little .... once had the water dry up on me ...forgot to top it up before lock down .... ended up peeling shells of those that survived ...(i know you shouldn't do that ...but it was my moronic mistake) ..

 

[SilkieLadee]

well if the humidity is too high during the first 18 days, the air sac can be too small, that's probably what people mean

 

[MysteryChicken]

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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?

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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...

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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!

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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.

I know this thread is old, but I have a question. I just put eggs on lockdown, and the humidity is at 99% is that too high for lock down?

 

[hysop]

I know this thread is old, but I have a question. I just put eggs on lockdown, and the humidity is at 99% is that too high for lock down?

How did your chicks do? I’m barely on day one of hatching my own eggs from my very own flock. Pretty excited, but am prepared and aware that 100% hatch rate is not always realistic, but I have high hopes haha

 

[MysteryChicken]

How did your chicks do? I’m barely on day one of hatching my own eggs from my very own flock. Pretty excited, but am prepared and aware that 100% hatch rate is not always realistic, but I have high hopes haha

They did pretty bad I lost all but 4. It was scary.

 

[hysop]

They did pretty bad I lost all but 4. It was scary.

I'm sorry to hear that. How many did you start off with? Do you think it was due to high humidity as well or other factors as well?