Drastic difference in air cells in eggs- Any idea why?

[mothersin2ition]

I'm hatching silkie eggs and mixed breed eggs. The silkie eggs all have very nice air cells- right where they should be. The mixed breed eggs all have *tiny* air cells- like what you would see on a day 7 candling...Im stumped. It's day 20 for the silkies today, and day 19 for the mixed eggs. Why in the world is there such a difference? The only thing I can think of is that the silkie eggs were older, and the mixed breed eggs were set the day after they were collected. I'm worried that the mixed eggs aren't going to hatch

, and crossing my fingers and toes that the silkies will at least....guess we'll see.

 

[subhanalah]

My silkie eggs last time had pretty big air cells too. Perhaps your silkies are ahead of schedule due to being bantams and the mixed breed eggs are right on schedule, and will just hatch on time and not early.


Just be sure to raise humidity immediately when you discover the drastic dip in even one egg, that means it's ready to pip, and if you don't raise humidity, it will die. (That's what happened to me, because I was following "the schedule" and waited about 8 hours after I discovered the dip, and even though they were still alive when I raised the humidity, it was too late, their fate was sealed. I lost three eggs due to this "early" dip)

 

[howfunkyisurchicken]

You'd be surprised the difference a single day can make in egg development.

And for what its worth, my Silkies hatch on day 21 just like all of my other eggs. And I've had chicks hatch just fine when I've forgotten to lockdown. I keep my humidity around 25-35%, so that's not alot of moisture for them to work with. What I'm saying is, those eggs are tougher than we think

 

[mothersin2ition]

so far, I have 2 silkies that hatched (as of 9pm on day 21) and nothing else happening. No pips on the rest of the silkies or other eggs. BUT I saw one of the big eggs rocking today, so at least one of them is alive, and I'm assuming some of the others are as well. My humidity is steady at around 50%- I cant get it any higher no matter what I try. But the silkies had nice moist membranes and hatched without any problems so Im not going to stress about trying to raise the humidity. I'll just keep it where it is now.
Crossing fingers that I wake up to more babies or pips tomorrow.