First & Probably Last Hatch

[RAnst4038]

Ordered $175 worth of eggs from 2 different farms.
Lousy non existent padding on 24 of them. They looked scrambled when they arrived.
62 eggs went in incubator, 44 left at lockdown. 14 never piped and now 4 have dropped dead at 3 days old.
What a rip-off!

 

[darkbluespace]

For a first hatch, starting with so many expensive shipped eggs is pretty ambitious! My first attempt at incubating was with shipped eggs and I had already started before I understood all of the complications that come with shipped eggs. No eggs hatched from that batch.
For my next few hatches I used local eggs, fortunately I could find the breeds I wanted within driving distance had 3 small 100% hatches in a row. Now I am trying some shipped eggs again... though they were not shipped far... and expect to have a less than perfect hatch rate. I already have a few quitters.

In any case, being new to hatching I have found that it truly is a art and I am getting better and learning a lot with each hatch. The reason my first eggs didn't hatch was because my humidity was too high and my ducks grew too big to zip out, a couple did manage to pip. From then on I did dry incubating... with just the eggs in the bator, the humidity was about 30% and I am doing really well with that. The tiny Serama eggs I am hatching now, I feel are needing very low humidity. My test eggs were around 35% humidity and they grew too big so I had to help a few out. I opened my venst to get humidity down to about 25% and I will keep an eye on the air cells of the ones still in the incubator.

So my point is that there are so many factors involved with each hatch... each breed is different, shipped eggs are a big challenge, humidity is an important factor you need to work out for your area and your incubator. Try some local eggs you have less invested in for experience and work your way up to shipped eggs. My first failure, though with only 4 eggs, was a big disappointment for me, but I am so happy I did more research and tried again because I deeply love this hatching experience and think I will be doing it for a long time to come.

 

[darkbluespace]

Did you have near 30 chicks hatch? That is a pretty normal percentage for shipped eggs. If four of them died already, I hope you are giving the rest some vitamins, electrolytes and probiotics so you don't loose more!