Hatching advice please. I'm getting discouraged.

[BeardedLadyFarm]

After two quite successful hatches I've gotten a bit discouraged this week. I've had two pretty much miserable hatches.

I got 18 GORGEOUS blue Ameraucana eggs from PipsandPeeps, and I had high hopes. All were fertile, and 13 developed to lockdown.

One pipped early, in the middle of the shell, and then died. One hatched naturally. Four I helped out to varying degrees. They're all still alive, and three are doing very well. One of those is having some leg issues.

I kept my temp at 99.5 with no spikes, and humidity between 20-30% for the first 18 days. At lockdown I raised the temp to 100.5 to 101 and humidity hovered around 80+%.

The chicks I had to help, or that pipped and died were shrink wrapped to some degree, some quite severely. The ones that didn't pip, I cracked open. Some where shrink wrapped tight, with the membrane white and stiff, while others were positively swimming and clearly had drowned.

Is this just typical of shipped eggs? There are so many variables that I don't know how to fix it. Was my humidity too low to start, and too high to finish? Any insight would be appreciated.

I've gotten a few chicks out of my last two hatches, and maybe that's all that can be expected from shipped eggs. Of course I had hoped for more.

(disclaimer- I know there's nothing "natural" about helping a chick to hatch, but in my mind there's nothing natural about taking an egg, bubble wrapping it, subjecting 5,000 miles via the postal service, putting it in a heated styrofoam and plastic box with a home depot thermometer and expecting it to hatch perfectly. If I had a broody right now, I'd let nature be nature, but I'm certain the mistakes were all mine, and not genetic flaws)

 

[ParadisePoultry]

I don't know if I can help, but a few questions. Are you sure your thermometer is accurate? A Brinsea Spot Check is the best. When inserted into a water wiggler, it gives you the exact temp of the inside of the egg. I don't know if you should raise the hatching temp, as the chicks generate a lot of heat themselves while hatching. Sounds like your humidity is right, have you calibrated your hygrometer?

Do you have an egg turner, or do you hand-turn? Do you have forced air or circulated? Some chicks being shrink wrapped and others drowned sounds strange. Although, sometimes, chicks that die shortly before hatching look drowned, but are just decomposing. Check your air cells. Do they all look big enough? They shouldn't be drowning if the air cells look big enough.

Do you often open the hatcher during lockdown?

I know I have my humidity so high during hatch that I get condensation on the door, but if I open the hatcher, I still get shrink wrapping on the pipped chicks. If you must open the hatcher, try to do it when there are no open pips.

I recently started putting moist wash cloths on top of the un-hatched eggs after I had to open the hatcher to get out a chick that needed help hatching. I don't know if it will help, but I still hear peeping from the eggs, so we'll see.

Hope you can figure this out. I know how dicouraging it is to wait so long and then get so few chicks. And to see perfectly formed chicks dying in the shell is heart-breaking. I finally gave up on styrofoam and made my own bator and hatcher. It was not expensive considering the price of shipped eggs, let alone your time and heart-ache when things don't work out

Best wishes with your hatching.

BJ

 

[Elite Silkies]

I never change the temp of my bator. I run 99.5 with circulated air and 102 in my still air. I run 55-60% humidity and then bump it to around 70-72% humidity for the last 3 days.

 

[BeardedLadyFarm]

Thanks for the ideas to consider.

My hygrometer and thermometer may not be accurate, but I have used two and they give the same reading, and I keep two thermometers in at all times.

I'm using forced air hovabators with turners.

I do admit to opening more than I should, BUT, I keep the incubator in the bathroom so I can steam up the whole place before I quickly reach in, and I also put a splash of hot water in the incubator (probably why my humidity goes so high). I've never seen a drop in temp. or humidity when I do it this way.

I wonder if position in the incubator during incubation changes anything. Being in the turner they stay in the same location most of incubation. Maybe there are hotspots in certain regions... I'll keep trying.

 

[Elite Silkies]

If your using forced air you want to keep your temp at 99.5 degrees for the entire 21 days. They probably got too hot with you turning up the heat. I would keep the humidity around 70% for the final 3 days. 80 is a bit high. But, everyone hatches differently, so what works for one may not work for others.

I would not splash any water inside the bator. The chicks can stay in the bator well over 24 hours and not have to be taken out. You should not ever open the bator on the last 3 lockdown days for any reason.

Unless it's an emergency and you just have to open it. When you open the bator it automatically sucks moisture out of the egg.

 

[silkiechicken]

I will have to agree that the increase in temp may have did them in. With a fan in there, it should be 99.5 from start to finish. The humidity from 1-18 may have been a bit low too so I suggest looking up air cell size during incubation and seeing if what you saw was similar when candling.

 

[Elite Silkies]

Too much humidity can also drown the chicks before they can pip.

 

[BeardedLadyFarm]

I feel like my air cells have been quite large, so I assume humidity was low during incubation?

Maybe my increased heat is to blame! I'll try the current hatch without touching the thermometer. Good to know. Thanks!

 

[Elite Silkies]

Let us know how it turns out.