duck eggs - should I worry?

[hfchristy]

Eggs started pipping last night.
I feel like last year the incubator was really noisy with peeping and eggs rattling against each other, and it's sooo quiet this time that I'm feeling a bit worried. If I bump the incubator, one or two will chirp about it, and on two occasions today I've seen a teeny wiggle.
I admit, I had to open it because I didn't put enough water in to start, so while I had it open, I grabbed one of the early pippers with a wet rag and did a quick candle. It responded vigorously to the light and chirped at me for bothering it.

Today's only day 26, so I'm not surprised if they need to hang out and absorb yolk a little longer, but the total lack of any visible progress whatsoever is driving me batty.

I had a duckling die last year while I was reading how to assist its hatch (had its bill through the hole, but not progressing, and another duck rolled the egg in such a way that the bill got wedged shut) so I'm a bit antsy.

 

[CochinBrahmaLover]

They're fine. The pip to zip stage is very quiet, and very unproductive. The big thing to watch out for is if they're zipping but stop part way - zip to out is fast, pip to zip is not.
If you need here's a link ~
https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/step-by-step-guide-to-assisted-hatching

 

[duckherder561]

I agree. We hatched runner duck eggs a week ago. Things were pretty quiet until day 28-29 then bam they started hatching like crazy. took about 30 minutes once they broke through to finally crawling out.

 

[hfchristy]

I thought it would be LESS stressful the second time around, but the differences from last time are driving me nuts, when last time I sort of shrugged and said "what do I know? They probably just do this."
Is it still no worry at 36 hours? more chipping around the pips, but it's not going anywhere, and things are still very quiet. A few have exposed membranes that have split open, but I haven't seen a bill yet. Seems like last time they were all poking their bills out as soon as there was an opening.
Maybe it's a difference of egg size? Last time I had eggs from a bantam mom, with a larger dad. I'm wondering whether small eggs with big ducklings meant there was precious little room for air in there and they needed to poke their heads out to breathe, but the nice big eggs this time have ample air cells, so there's less rush?

 

[hfchristy]

Well, the quietly pipped ones don't seem to have been anything to worry about! 11 of 14 so far on those.
But the ones that didn't pip with the rest... those didn't fare so well.

The ambient humidity in the room was pushing 80%, and inside the incubator around 95%, so I figured nothing was going to dry out if I peeked. There were two that had internally pipped that were active and pecking away. Considered making an air hole, but didn't have anything handy, then had a toddler watching and didn't want him to think this was a thing to do with incubating eggs. Came back an hour later with the exacto and they were dead. No shrink wrapping, though, thank goodness.

I think one egg was just so large, and with such a large air cell, that the duck couldn't reach the shell. The other one, the eye tooth had broken before the egg did! would you classify that as a defect that you wouldn't want to pass on in the genes anyway and chalk it up to natural selection? Or just too much oyster shell for the ladies?

The incubator says it holds 42 eggs. I assume that means that it should be able to hold 42 chicks/ducklings, but I just don't see how. The 11 I have in there now are about as crowded as seems reasonable. 20... maybe. 30... I guess if they had to. But, 42???
I know most people don't have perfect hatches, but it would be nice to think the incubator folks at least believed it was a theoretical possibility!

 

[duckherder561]

only will comment on capacity. We have a hava bator claims 42 also. I put 40 duck eggs in without the turner no problem. I did eliminate 5 at 8 days. never had a space problem. They hatched over 36 hours freeing up space as they went to the brooder.