First PIP! qUeStIoN?

[morgakl2]

Last night was day 21. At 10:30 PM I heard chirping for the very first time ever!!!! This morning I see a pip or a crack in the top of the shell. But, I don't hear chirping anymore and I don't see rocking. Last night my humidity was 81%. When I woke up this morning it was 63%. I added more water to the paper towels, so the humidity is now back up to 81%. Questions: Does chirping stop when pipping begins? Once a crack is formed, how long should it take it to get out of the shell? When should I help, or did it already die?

 

[pete55]

Hi

They can go quiet for a while after pipping. However once pipped you should always be able to hear the chick breathing. Hold the air cell end of the egg up to your ear in a quiet area and listen. You should hear a regular faint clicking/tapping noise which is the chick breathing in and out.

Here's a thread on incubation I did earlier which describes this process in more detail.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=491013

Also there are more incubation links on our website;

http://oakgarthgeese.com

Best of luck

Pete

 

[dwegg]

Isn't 81% a little high for hatching?

Mine made a crack last night at about 11pm and didn't do anything else till 6am this morning...then once she started moving again she was out in less than 30 mins...

 

[Ridgerunner]

The hatching process can really agonize us. When a chick hatches, it goes through three distinct phases, internal pip, external pip, and zipping. During this process it has to absorb the yolk, dry up blood vessels it does not need anymore, convert to breathing air instead of living in a liquid world, and go through who knows how many other changes. It is not just setting there resting. It is working hard.

Some do most of this stuff between internal pip and external pip. These are the ones that hatch out pretty quickly after the external pip. Some do most of this after external pip. These are the ones that drive us crazy waiting on them. I have not had it go this long, but some people report waiting over 24 hours for this phase and they still hatch on their own. A few have not totally finished all the preparation when they zip, but most of even these make it OK.

Some chicks don't make it through this process. For many different reasons, they can die, not all due to humidity issues. But some do get shrink-wrapped. This can be a little hard to recognize, especially if you don't have experience with it. It is hard to determine when to help. If you help too soon and it has not prepared itself for the outside world, you can wind up killing it. If you wait too late, it can die. Some people go by how the membrane looks. If it looks dry, they help. If you see a yellow foam start leaking out, it is now or never. They don't all leak that yellow foam, but several do.

I don't know how accurate your hygrometer is, but 63% is not all that bad. Some people target that range, but I like to be a little higher. We all use different hunmidities because different humidities work better for some of us than others. I target 65% to 75%, but after the hatch starts, humidity often goes up to 85% to 90%. For me, that means it is looking good. It is possible that chick got shrink wrapped, but not really likely at 63%. And even if it is shrink wrapped, it should not have died that quickly from being shrink wrapped if it managed to break through the inner membrane. There are so many things that could have happened that I can only guess. One of the major things that could have happened is that it is absorbing the yolk and drying up blood vessels.

You should not open the incubator during the hatch. You can shrink wrap chicks that have pipped. But I do what I have to do. I have shrink wrapped a chick by opening the incubator, but I did not shrink wrap all of them. And I don't always shrink wrap any of them. You take a risk when you open it, but you do not guarantee that you will shrink wrap all of them. If you do open it, don't worry about heat loss. The incubator should recover long before any damage is done there. Humidity loss is the issue. Some incubators recover humidity faster than others, some of us have a higher humidity in the roomn than others. How long it is open is important. When you open it, you can possibly mist warm water in there as you close it to get the humidity back up or add warm water to the reservoir, depending on what type of incubator you have. You do not want to use hot water. Those insulated incubators don't shed excess heat very well and you can cause a temperature spike if you use much hot water. Use water just a little warmer than incubator temperatures to help recovery.

With all this, there is a pretty good chance you will not need to intervene. Odds are patience is your best friend right now. But maybe you are a little better preopared just in case.

Good luck! It is a stressful time but usually ends up being a happy time.

 

[morgakl2]

It is killing me being at work right now! Does anyone know where I can get a cheap web cam? Thank you for all the wonderful advice! Right before I left the house at 7:20 , I did hear it peep again. And I stared at the crack in the shell and I'm pretty sure I saw it gap open just a little. With my nose permanent flattened from pressing against the window, I hope I didn't imagine it! Bc I have two different sets of eggs in the bator ( one due yesterdAy and one due in 2 weeks) I was told by byc people to keep the humidity high for when I have to open during lock down to turn the younger eggs. It has worked well bc old eggs are toward the back and new eggs are in a straight line on the front, so I only have to crack it open a little to turn them quickly. I had warm water to the pAper towels every time I do this and he humidiy bounces back real quick. I'm thinking that since I heard it chirp again, it couldn't have gotten shrink wrapped. It's my only egg out of 8 that I had shipped from Penn to Alabama. So I hope the little partridge silkie makes it! ( bad word) I wish I was home now!

 

[Chicken Chat]

The waiting is always the hardest. Hopefully you have a cute little fuzzy butt when you get home.

 

[Sphinx]

Well, I am super experienced now, as I have hatched 4 chicks in the past 30 hours or so.

I have to admit Ridgerunner's advice would've been nice to see when I was obsessing yesterday.

What I found in my (severely) limited experience is that the chick will pip, and then nothing happens for hours. and hours. and hours. I stayed up half the night because two of my chicks had pipped, and I was just SURE they were going to hatch any minute. Nope.

It started out with a tiny hole, like this:

Within a couple hours, it was a little bigger, like this:

From there, I could peek inside and see the chick moving. At this point though, all four chicks kind of stalled for a good 12 hours at this point. After that, it moved very quickly. Once they woke up again and started working at the shell, it was over fast.

The next few pictures were all taken within 10 minutes or so:

 

[morgakl2]

Update: I rushed home from work to find no fuzzy butts

i tried to take a picture to show yall the crack in the shell but I guess i dont have a good enough camera or I don't know how to work it. the crack is bigger than what I saw this morning. It's somewhere inbetween Princess's posted pictures 1 and 2. Good news, I did see rocking, and the broken part of the shell raise up. I heard chirping too!

all hope is not lost!!!

 

[dwegg]

Nope not lost! They are coming...just have to give them time so when they come out they are ready...I have four eggs pipped atm and haven't had any progress now for hours but I can hear them and it's killing me.

But we just have to wait and they will come.

 

[morgakl2]

Quote:
I think this is they invented Xanax!! I was in there earlier chanting, "push em out, push em out, WAAAAAY out!"

At least my chick will know at an early age that her momma is crazy.