Hi all, I had 10 WH duck eggs in my R-com 10 (which is new but seems to be working well). I've only hatched chickens before so ducks are new to me too! All were fertile and developing well, last candled day 24.
On the evening of day 27 we noticed lots of rocking, and the first few pips appeared. By morning of day 28, 9 of 10 had pips and some signs of unzipping and still lots of movement, so all looked great. One duckling hatched, but that was it. By morning of day 29 there had been no progress from the other 9, and the holes were looking dry and leathery. No noises or movements detected so I decided to to open the incubator. I carefully followed the instructions for assisted hatching. The first chick to have pipped was dead in the egg, it had it's beak out of the hole it had made, there was lots of fluid yet it was shrink wrapped. The same with the next chick. The chicks were very large, well presented but had not finished absorbing the yolk so were not ready to hatch, yet could presumably breathe having broken out of the membrane and shell. The others are still alive and having removed the shell from the air space they are needing more time to absorb yolk, yet are also obviously shrink wrapped and will need help when they are ready. Keeping fingers crossed they will make it!
The incubator was showing 50% humidity from day 1-25, I then increased humidity to 57% which increased again to 60% after the first chick hatched. The chicks looked large and very wet, with lots of gooey fluid so I'm wondering if humidity was too high, yet they were shrink wrapped which suggests too low!?!? The incubator was not opened between day 24-28. Any suggestions to what went wrong?
On the evening of day 27 we noticed lots of rocking, and the first few pips appeared. By morning of day 28, 9 of 10 had pips and some signs of unzipping and still lots of movement, so all looked great. One duckling hatched, but that was it. By morning of day 29 there had been no progress from the other 9, and the holes were looking dry and leathery. No noises or movements detected so I decided to to open the incubator. I carefully followed the instructions for assisted hatching. The first chick to have pipped was dead in the egg, it had it's beak out of the hole it had made, there was lots of fluid yet it was shrink wrapped. The same with the next chick. The chicks were very large, well presented but had not finished absorbing the yolk so were not ready to hatch, yet could presumably breathe having broken out of the membrane and shell. The others are still alive and having removed the shell from the air space they are needing more time to absorb yolk, yet are also obviously shrink wrapped and will need help when they are ready. Keeping fingers crossed they will make it!
The incubator was showing 50% humidity from day 1-25, I then increased humidity to 57% which increased again to 60% after the first chick hatched. The chicks looked large and very wet, with lots of gooey fluid so I'm wondering if humidity was too high, yet they were shrink wrapped which suggests too low!?!? The incubator was not opened between day 24-28. Any suggestions to what went wrong?
