Chirping has stopped

[ImAHotMess]

I'm totally new to raising chickens and saw these gorgeous black copper marans eggs. Even though I'm totally inexperienced I bought an incubator and gave it a try. Last night I heard chirping. I heard faint chirping this morning and now nothing. That was 3 hours ago. Today is day 21. I'm so worried that I killed them. Should I just leave them alone or try and externally pip them myself? They are so dark and I cannot candle them. This link has me totally freaked out so I don't want to jump the gun. https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/step-by-step-guide-to-assisted-hatching

 

[SIMZ]

Hatching can be one of the most anxiety producing situations EVER! LOL

DO NOT mess with those eggs or open the incubator. If you can hear chirping then everything is just fine. It takes a while for them to hatch - even once they pip it can be up to 24 hours before the chick hatches. There can be times when a chick can benefit from assistance, but in my experience, it's only when they have glued in their shell and honestly cannot hatch because of humidity issues. Anytime I've tried helping a chick before that, I've caused more harm than good, or discovered there was a pretty good reason that chick wasn't hatching.

Hatching is not for the weak! I know how hard it is, but DO NOT mess with them. I'd suggest finding something to do for the rest of the day so you aren't checking. I find that the more I check the more convinced I am that there is a problem - when there really isn't.

Best of luck! Please keep us posted with how your hatch goes.

 

[AmyLynn2374]

I'm totally new to raising chickens and saw these gorgeous black copper marans eggs. Even though I'm totally inexperienced I bought an incubator and gave it a try. Last night I heard chirping. I heard faint chirping this morning and now nothing. That was 3 hours ago. Today is day 21. I'm so worried that I killed them. Should I just leave them alone or try and externally pip them myself? They are so dark and I cannot candle them. This link has me totally freaked out so I don't want to jump the gun. https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/step-by-step-guide-to-assisted-hatching

If you heard chirping last night from within the shells it is an indication that they internally pipped. It can take 24 hours to progress from internal pip to external pip and another 24 from external to zip. I'm not a big advocate of going into an unpipped egg, but I would definitely give it a good 24 hours from the time you first heard them before thinking about doing a safety hole. BCMs can be harder to hatch because they tend to loose moisture slower. If you at any point need help with assisting feel free to join us on the hands on hatching and help thread.

 

[ImAHotMess]

Thank you both so much! I will wait for sure then. Since hearing their sweet chirps I've been so anxious. They were just eggs before that. Now they are chicks to me!

This is my first post ever. I'm completely new to this but I've totally been sucked into the love of chickens! How do I get to the hands on hatching page?

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Thank you both so much! I will wait for sure then. Since hearing their sweet chirps I've been so anxious. They were just eggs before that. Now they are chicks to me!

This is my first post ever. I'm completely new to this but I've totally been sucked into the love of chickens! How do I get to the hands on hatching page?

Hatching is addictive once you've seen one hatch. This is the hands on thread, https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/1081034/hands-on-hatching-and-help join us any time, and

 

[ImAHotMess]

Yay! They are progressing. I'm hearing more chirping too. One is zipping and another has externally pipped. The pip was hard to see at first so maybe there will be others too?

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Yay! They are progressing. I'm hearing more chirping too. One is zipping and another has externally pipped. The pip was hard to see at first so maybe there will be others too?

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[SIMZ]

Yay! They are progressing. I'm hearing more chirping too. One is zipping and another has externally pipped. The pip was hard to see at first so maybe there will be others too?

AWESOME!!

 

[ImAHotMess]

For some reason, I wasn't able to post but now I can. I just wanted to update because I always like to know how things turned out on other posts I read. I had 9 eggs and 7 of the hatched. I did have to assist on most. One hadn't done a thing for 12 hours after he had partially zipped. Not even 1/4 of the way. The last of the babies was bleeding from his umbilicus when he finally came out. I was sure he was going to die. I went to work worrying but he ended up being fine. So fine, that now we don't know which chick it was. I cracked the other two eggs just to make sure there wasn't a chick inside unable to get out. They both were just runny eggs. Nothing had developed at all. I'm guessing they were not fertilized. Anyway, I got many more chicks than I had hoped for and we are loving them! They are the sweetest things ever!

 

[AmyLynn2374]

For some reason, I wasn't able to post but now I can. I just wanted to update because I always like to know how things turned out on other posts I read. I had 9 eggs and 7 of the hatched. I did have to assist on most. One hadn't done a thing for 12 hours after he had partially zipped. Not even 1/4 of the way. The last of the babies was bleeding from his umbilicus when he finally came out. I was sure he was going to die. I went to work worrying but he ended up being fine. So fine, that now we don't know which chick it was. I cracked the other two eggs just to make sure there wasn't a chick inside unable to get out. They both were just runny eggs. Nothing had developed at all. I'm guessing they were not fertilized. Anyway, I got many more chicks than I had hoped for and we are loving them! They are the sweetest things ever!

Awe, congrats!