Chinese quail headache!

[mavispig123]

Hi,
I have purchased some chinese quail hatching eggs from ebay. We incubated them in our homemade incubator, stopped turning after day 12 & started waiting for signs of hatching. Yesterday we got to day 18 & still nothing so we decided to try to float test the eggs. Unfortunately the one we took out got dropped & cracked, then a little beak poked out. Not knowing what to do we put it back in the incubator. It is still moving about but doesn't seem to be making any progress getting out of the shell.
Everything that I have read on the internet says that if any hatch after day 18 they will probably die anyway so I'm unsure what to do now. Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[GrandmaBird]

leave it alone! do not give up you may have an good hatch anyway...the time depends a lot on the egg temp during shipping, handling and incubation. If you used a homemade incubator did the temp hold steady and the humidity keep up? All these things can delay hatching so 16 days is not a must hatch by date! give them up to 20 - 22 days then you could check one or two to see but if one is moving surely others are as well. try peeping at them and see if you get an answer. the one in the broken shell will most likely die from being dropped but ya never know.
temp should be 100 in a still air incubator and humidity should be 50-60%.
good luck keep us posted

 

[mavispig123]

thanks for your reply, I think the temperature may have been a bit low as they have started hatching tonight. We now have 6 hatched & the little one that got cracked is out & still alive. Fingers crossed we will get a few more as there still seems to be alot of movement in the incubator

 

[GrandmaBird]

good...now for some pics?!

 

[mavispig123]

Here they are, the one at the front of the second picture is the one we had to help out. 11 of the 18 eggs hatched.

 

[GrandmaBird]

are you using a red lamp bulb? if so please change it to a clear 60 watt bulb. these little birds can not see well in red light and sometimes it is too hot as well. and boy do they grow fast! you will not believe it...good luck and nice hatch rate.

 

[ElizabethChau]

Thank you so much for sharing this! I am currently on day 10 with my incubating button quail eggs . 31 eggs! All in my homemade incubator
I'm glad to here such a great hatch rate for another homemade bator! I'm so excited for my hatching day, and Priscilla, one of my females, has suddenly decided she will be a rare one and actually sit and hatch a clutch of her own! So on top of my 31 in the bator she has (I THINK, hard to count under her!) 8 eggs of her own. I'm so hopeful for a great hatch rate!!! Well done to you