DOA

[rwcmick]

Out of my 32 remaining eggs I got 16 healthy babies. However out of the remaining eggs there were about 6 eggs that didn't hatch, but had candled well. I waited three days after day 21 before opening up the incubator and cracked up the eggs. I found fully formed chicks that seems to have died at the very end. There were no signs of lfe. I'm unclear as to what could've happened.

They were in an auto turner until the last 3 days. The humditiy was between 50-60% until the last 3 days when it was 75 to 80%. The 16 chicks that did hatch popped out like popcorn, but I'm puzzled as to what happened to these little guys. Kind of sad to see them develop so far...Any thoughts?

 

[silkiechicken]

Lots of stuff can go wrong just before hatch. Chick ran out of energy, drowned just because that egg shell was a bit harder than the others and so didn't lose enough energy, tired, lacking some development, head position wrong, humidity changing when taking out the popcorns. There is a chart somewhere that has a list of possible things that went wrong but I don't know where it is at the moment. dhunicorn probally knows where it is.

 

[rwcmick]

thanks for the info. for a first timer i'm happy with the little fluff balls that i got. next time i try i'll be that much wiser!