guinea eggs hatch problems

[wooky1971]

Hey everyone. I have some issues and i would like some input. I got 18 guinea eggs out of a nest in a brush pile. I put them in an untested, home made incubator. Its a digital thermostate, digital temp and humidity, fan at the top forcing air downward. I kept humidity around 50%. It is not vented to the ouside. After candeling I had 8 viable eggs. The keets started piping about day 25. The guinea hens have been eating layer pellets so the shells are really thick. None of them seemed to be able to do more then pip the shell. I started out by flicking the shell away where they piped and opening up a small hole where the beak was. Still no progress. I ended up helping them all out of the shell even though I didnt want to. Anyway. I have one keet that is laying on its side and wont get up. It legs, wings, and neck all seem to be working fine. I got it to take some water. I can hold it up in my hand and it sit fine. just a little weak. When I put it back down it works its way around till its laying on its left side and if I open up the brooder it will just kick its legs and kick around in a circle. The keet came out of the egg about 2am this morning. On a seperate not, in the future would taking the guineas off layer pellets help in the hatching process?

 

[phoenix912]

I'm sorry I don't know anything about guineas. Have you tried posting on the emergency page?

 

[wooky1971]

ok. So im going to post this in the hope that someone else will get some benifit. I did some reading on here and saw something about putting them in a coffee cup and proping them up. I started to do this and i noticed that all the keets toes were curled. He couldnt stand up on two curled feet so all he did was lay on his side and kick. I put tape on both feet and now he is sitting on his butt. He is trying to walk but cant get use to the booties I made. They were way too big and I just switched them over to cut down bandaids.I cut off half the length of the adhesive strip on each side. I put the cotton patch under his foot and wraped the adhisive ends over the top of the foot. The toes are actually looking better this evening then when I started out this morning.