- Mar 17, 2011
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Howdy,
I have some Runner ducks (shipped eggs). Most of them did not thrive, but there are four nearing hatch. I thought the hatch date to expect external pipping was sooner than it was, so, after candling and seeing triangles in the air cells, and movement, I thought they all had internally pipped. I was anxious to salvage something from a lot of bad luck shipped eggs, and after reading the Assist article several times, thought "I'll make safety holes because these eggs are valuable to me and it looks like they've internally pipped" and did so yesterday.
Today I can see little beaks inside the teeny holes doing the yawning and chewing thing, so those seemed fine and doing the slow hatch thing, except in one egg. In that egg, I thought I was signs of shrinkwrapping. I carefully poked a bigger hole so I could see if this was the case and I think I have mistook an inner membrane around the developing duckling - the one with all the veins and what not -- for the "shrink wrapping" membrane on the inside of the shell. No internal pip after all, just a duckling clearly not as far along as the others. I saw a large bit of yolk left and a lot of veins, no beak. I think it's head is currently turned downwards. I didn't want to poke any more than I already had. I gently covered the membrane with neosporin, made sure the incubator humidity was high, and even covered the hole I'd made in the shell with dampened thin tissue.
What else should I do other than leave it be? Make sure the membrane stays moist? Am I confused about shrinkwrapping? Does that involve a *different* membrane then the one with the veins in it? This was clearly a dividing line between the duckling's part of the egg and the large air cell. It didn't look yellow/brown, really, just clearish, veiny and a bit white towards the shell. The shell itself has a thin white inner membrane that was visible when I chipped off bits of shell over the air sac.
Edited to add: It also occurs to me that possibly the chick is facing away from the air cell. That's why the yolk is up near the air cell and I can't see a beak. I reviewed the Assist article (again!
) and if this is the case, my understanding is the chick will externally pip without internally pipping.
I have some Runner ducks (shipped eggs). Most of them did not thrive, but there are four nearing hatch. I thought the hatch date to expect external pipping was sooner than it was, so, after candling and seeing triangles in the air cells, and movement, I thought they all had internally pipped. I was anxious to salvage something from a lot of bad luck shipped eggs, and after reading the Assist article several times, thought "I'll make safety holes because these eggs are valuable to me and it looks like they've internally pipped" and did so yesterday.
Today I can see little beaks inside the teeny holes doing the yawning and chewing thing, so those seemed fine and doing the slow hatch thing, except in one egg. In that egg, I thought I was signs of shrinkwrapping. I carefully poked a bigger hole so I could see if this was the case and I think I have mistook an inner membrane around the developing duckling - the one with all the veins and what not -- for the "shrink wrapping" membrane on the inside of the shell. No internal pip after all, just a duckling clearly not as far along as the others. I saw a large bit of yolk left and a lot of veins, no beak. I think it's head is currently turned downwards. I didn't want to poke any more than I already had. I gently covered the membrane with neosporin, made sure the incubator humidity was high, and even covered the hole I'd made in the shell with dampened thin tissue.
What else should I do other than leave it be? Make sure the membrane stays moist? Am I confused about shrinkwrapping? Does that involve a *different* membrane then the one with the veins in it? This was clearly a dividing line between the duckling's part of the egg and the large air cell. It didn't look yellow/brown, really, just clearish, veiny and a bit white towards the shell. The shell itself has a thin white inner membrane that was visible when I chipped off bits of shell over the air sac.
Edited to add: It also occurs to me that possibly the chick is facing away from the air cell. That's why the yolk is up near the air cell and I can't see a beak. I reviewed the Assist article (again!
) and if this is the case, my understanding is the chick will externally pip without internally pipping.
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