egg weight

[da1goth2]

Hi, i was just wondering how much a japanese quail egg should weigh on day 14 of incubation if anyone knows? When i started out they were just over 10g each and seen as it's lockdown day i thought i'd weigh them quickly out of curiosity and they are roughly 8g is that a bad sign? Just wondering as i just assumed eggs would weigh more not less.

 

[vehve]

I'm only familiar with hatching chicken eggs, but with them you'll want about a 13-14% decrease in weight when going into lockdown. Your weights seem to be about right, assuming your scale only shows 1g precision. The developing embryo is built up from materials already within the egg, so the weight won't increase, but some moisture will evaporate from the egg, making it lighter. This is a good thing, since too wet of an environment would drown the bird to be when it's hatching time.

 

[da1goth2]

I thought the eggs may have lost too much moisture or something, i feel better now. Thanks for the info fingers crossed that they hatch now then

 

[vehve]

It sounds like a lot, but if the eggs were actually 9.6g in the beginning, and now 8.4, it would be about right. But I'd keep the moisture high towards the end if I were you. Again, I've only hatched chicken eggs, so I'm not sure what the weight loss should be with quail eggs. Next time you should weigh all the eggs together to monitor the weight loss, you get better precision that way (since your scale will only register 1g differences, you need a single egg to lose 1g to notice it, but weighing ten eggs at a time will register a combined loss of 1g when a individual egg has only lost 0.1g)

 

[da1goth2]

I have humidity at 60 percent it's been just over 50 until now. I have a tiny very accurate scales i don't remember exactly what they weighed before but it was just over 10g now they were 8.5 and there abouts so i'm hoping all is well. When i candled them the day before yesterday no light would pass through and they had good air sacks so i'm hoping they are ok, but my incubator is homemade and i just don't expect them to hatch lol and i thought they wouldnt make it this far, but i guess i don't have long to find out

 

[vehve]

Well, sounds like they're doing well so far. Good luck with your hatch.