I have no experience so I can't give you very good direction. I've just been studying a book I bought on incubating and hatching. If it has air and you know it can breathe I don't think it will hurt to give it a little longer. It may just need a little break. Best to ask one of the more knowledgeable people here. They can help.you better then me..He/she is in the possession it was in this morning. No scooching around to zip, just sitting there breathing and chepping. I took this pic a couple of hours ago and it hasn't changed at all.
If the eggs you are concerned about are close to or over the anticipated hatch date, you can try the water test. Put each of the eggs you are concerned about, one at a time, in a bowl of warm water. Wait until the water settles from the disturbance of the egg going in. If there is a live chick in there, you may well see the water wiggle and the egg jiggle a little bit. Now, just because they don't happen to move at that instant doesn't mean they aren't still alive....they could just be resting....but if you do see the wiggle mark the egg and get it back into the incubator before it chills because that little booger is still hanging in there. I don't know how others with more experience feel about the water candling, but since I am pretty doggone new to this whole hatching thing, it's one thing I do try with late and hard to determine hatches.
My first keet is out
I don't mess till 18 hours, and then I still end up giving them until 24 usually once I see that everything is ok and the veins are still prominent. I really really really think many people mistake a normal inner membrane as shrink wrapped because it looks like its wrinkly and wrapped around them, (which it is,) but if it's still transparent and the chick can move it's usually not the case. I have a few pics of truely shrinkwrapped chicks, and you can really see the difference. When I first started out I panicked a couple times thinking I saw shrink wrapped (thanks to all the preachers of shrink wrap on here) only to find once I started an assist, it really wasn't.
Hatching is a learning experience and we ALL make the wrong decision at some point, especially early on in the learning curve. After lockdown the air cell draws down and it's a significant difference. I've had eggs with perfect air cells drawn down so much after day 18 that they indeed shrink wrapped. We can do everything perfect and still loose some. Always adjust for the majority not the minority, but take what you've learned and add it to your experience points. Many of us try to save them all, it's human nature-well, for some of us.
so, when i candled almost 2 days ago, what i saw was a big blob in the air cell. not a beak, i realized later. it wasn't a triangle. but the air cell had a dark mass in it on one side and i assumed it was the chick's body entering the air cell. anyway, i had all the eggs set so that the slope of the air cell was on top. both of these pipped on the bottom, a half inch or higher above the air cell line, straight through the membrane and shell. i have about a ballion thoughts running through my head right now, but the primary one is that this is my fault from day 15 on. i had 4 very healthy eggs and one that i was pretty sure was dead, but i very foolishly (man, that hindsight) decided to try to give that one egg one more shot, and i didn't raise the humidity past 50 until day 19 because nobody had pipped and i wanted to be suuuuure that air cell on that dead chick wasn't going to grow. when i made that choice, i already knew that these 2 had enormous air cells and i dramatically underestimated how much more they would grow in an 18 hour period. i think these two were on their way to proper positioning and ran out of room. though honestly, i can't be totally sure.
what i know more than anything right now is that i need to give a lot more respect to survival of the fittest and not compromise 4 healthy chicks on behalf of one that i already had assumed was dead. i'm super displeased with myself right now.
also, i redid their paper towels so that most of the membrane and opening is covered. everyone is breathing a little easier, though still quickly, beaks are moving around nicely, chirping is still happening. so i figure my job right now is to just keep the membranes from drying out and to wait wait wait wait wait wait wait. they can breathe, they are safe. as much time as i can buy them in the shell without that membrane drying out and sticking to them, the better their odds.
Eggsposions are rare especially later in the hatch (not impossible, just more rare). Usually your eggs that explode have gotten bacteria in them early on and that is the catalyst. (And it's still not really a common thing.) I do NOT generally take anything out after day 10 unless I am 100% that it is a goner. My first hatch I pulled one I thought was, only to find I was wrong and it's heartbreaking to know you single handedly killed a chick because you guessed wrong. So if it doesn't smell or leak, it stays in unless there is no doubt.We are still early on. About a week. I just don't want an egg explosion mess. I'm afraid if I can't tell it could infect all my others.
. Guess only time will tell..
