Day 22 no piping !!

[KellyAndMark]

Hi, so we've done a couple hatchings before.. 2 with good results, 1 not so good, but always on day 21 they hatched. We bought a new incubator, an "eggcubator" its yellow on top clear on the bottom and has the automatic turner. We've kept the temp at 38 and humidity in the high 50's, and managed to raise it to the 60's for the last 4 days. How late can eggs hatch? There's a mix of egs in there from Americana to Reds and a few randoms

 

[XxMingirlxX]

Eggs can hatch late at up to 24 or 25 days so I wouldn't worry yet! The best advice I can give you is to read this article on hatching :
https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/hatching-eggs-101

 

[KellyAndMark]

Thanks for the article! What a ton of info in there, I'm picking away at it

So we're at day 24. One egg had pipped yesterday, so we were expecting a baby out this morning, but when we got up it was dead with it's entire beak out of the hole in the egg !? What causes a chick to get that far then not make it?.. probably a lot of things I guess.

2 more pipped over night and are making noise

Now.. the float test. We started by float tested about 8 eggs to see what was going on.. keeping the hopefuls and putting the duds in a box. YEA. About 2 minutes later one of the "duds" in the box started peeping for us to get it back into the incubator!!! I'M ALIVE I'M ALIVE!! So,.. we're just going to leave everything alone in there and give them some more time.

I'm not so sure about this new incubator now.. 48 eggs and we're now hoping that the 3 piped ones at least make it.

 

[AmyLynn2374]

If you had your humidity in the high 50% range I would say more than likely the chicks drowned at hatch or had other complications due to high humidity during the first 17 days of incubation. Anything over 45% in my opinion is too high for incubation.
Also if you are going by the digital read outs on the incubator w/no accurate independent thermometer/hygrometer in the unit that itself could be a problem as though units are often innaccurate with temps/humidity.
I would suggest adding a checked/calibrated thermometer and hygrometer in the bator to check the bator's own read outs and I would suggest using a low humidity incubation method and monitoring the air cells for proper growth to know if your humidity levels are ok. The low humidity incubation (improperly known as a "dry" incubation) has very good results in the styro bators and I do know a couple people that have used it in this bator with good results as well. You can read more on the method and monitoring air cells here: http://letsraisechickens.weebly.com...anuals-understanding-and-controlling-humidity

Good luck in future hatches.