Good pip location?

[PaisyQ]

I'm about as excited as I can be right now. I have 7 eggs in the incubator, and 3 have started to pip. If things go well, this will be my first successful hatch. My first attempt at incubation earlier this fall had 4 eggs develop to about day 18, and then stop. So these are my first to actually try and hatch.

Of course, that means I'm worrying about everything. First off, it's day 20, not day 21, so these guys seem to have jumped the gun a bit. Second is this egg:



As I noted on the picture, the original pip is up there by the day 7 air cell line, which I thought seemed sort of high. Now the second spot the chick has broken through the shell is directly below this, on the day 14 air cell line. I'm a little worried this baby might be positioned wrong? Or is this sort of normal? This egg is rocking all over the place, and someone in the incubator is cheeping like crazy. I think it's this guy, but not certain.

I'm supposed to be going to bed in half an hour, so I can get up in time for work in the morning. Probably won't be able to sleep now; darn eggs. Why'd they have to go and start hatching a day early? You were supposed to hatch over the weekend when I can be home...

 

[wolfandfinch]

looks good to me! You don't have to worry so much about drowning with nice clear in the aircell pips. Congrats! I have one that just hatched and another that just pipped

 

[PaisyQ]

Thanks.

Seems I like to worry over nothing. She's zipped almost halfway around the shell now, and everything is looking very good.

 

[PaisyQ]

... and she's out. .

This is cool. My newly hatched chick is making enough noise to raise the dead, I swear. But I can now hear at least two other chicks chirping amoung the Unhatched. Are they talking together, I wonder? No one else was chirping before this one hatched.

 

[wolfandfinch]

... and she's out.

.

This is cool. My newly hatched chick is making enough noise to raise the dead, I swear. But I can now hear at least two other chicks chirping amoung the Unhatched. Are they talking together, I wonder? No one else was chirping before this one hatched.

that was fast! mine are taking FOREVER!

 

[PaisyQ]

Yeah, the others are taking there time, too. I had a second one zipping this morning, expect it to be hatched by the time I get home this afternoon. 4 of the 5 remaining now have pips. Should be an exciting day! If only I could be home to watch.

 

[LTygress]

Typically, they get REALLY, REALLY chatty like that when they are at the zipping stage. It's actually a very helpful tool when you become more experienced, and need to help one who may be stuck in there and can't move around to zip the egg. You'll know he's cleared himself from the blood vessels, absorbed the yolk, and is ready to get out when they chirp like that - just might be "glued" to the inner membrane because it dried out too much.

 

[PaisyQ]

Thanks! This is good info to have. Hopefully I'll have many more hatches in the future.

Got home from work to find 5 babies crowded in the incubator, 1 egg still at just pipped stage and 1 still unpipped. I was quite surprised, and a little disappointed. I really wanted to watch more of them hatch!

 

[wolfandfinch]

This one just isn't progressing on its own. I took off a a little shell and membrane within the air cell area. It was definitely stuck to the membrane. It was so strong though so I decided to let it do the rest itself because I didn't want to rush it and find it hadn't finished absorbing its yolk. It's still not getting out on its own but I will wait a couple more hours before doing more. It will be ok to wait if it can chirp and breathe freely right?

 

[PaisyQ]

#6 is out of the shell; that leaves just 1 unhatched egg. I got to watch this one, though barely. Everyone else was tripping over it so much, and it looked like it was only about a quarter of the way zipped. It wobbled a bit, made one big push, and was out. I wasn't expecting that.

I desperately want to open up the incubator and have a look at the unpipped egg. It bothers me terribly that it isn't doing anything, and I want to know why. I'm using my limited patience, however, and holding off. Trying to ignore it while I study it's clutchmates instead. Oh, I can't wait until the dry off and I can get some good pictures of them.