Hatching anamoly

[Tom Kathleen]

We have first season peafowl eggs (almost 2 years old peahens and peacocks). Because these are the first eggs laid, we knew hatch rate would be low, but they were fertile. For the first three, they all had the same issue. They developed fine and have fully formed chicks, but sometime past day 20 and before day 26, they stopped moving and did not hatch. We can't say EXACTLY what day because we don't open the incubator very often as THAT can cause problems. They never pipped. We have a circulated air incubator with an automated egg turner. Humidity is checked 2x a day and is at about 60 percent. We have excellent hatch rates with guinesa and chickens. We knew peafowl are harder, but can't figure out why they get ALMOST to pipping, then die 3-5 days before hatch. Thanks for help!

 

[KsKingBee]

Because your humidity is too high. The egg has to lose around 13 to 15% of its total weight for there to be enough room in the egg for the chick to swing its head to chip out. If they do not lose enough weight the chick is too big and takes up too much room. The other problem is that once the chick internally pips any excess moisture in the egg can drown the chick. It is a delicate balance that you will have to find that works for your locale and your local conditions. Even the room you are using makes a difference. We incubate in our basement now as the room is kept at a steady temperature and humidity. Our settings work best around 40 to 45% humidity and 100* then up the humidity to 60% at hatch. Remember your settings will differ but you will have to find your sweet spot that works for you. Also, the timing of the hatch will dictate the temperature. When we incubated in the living room our temp setting was 99.4* and they would hatch on day 26 as they should, but when we moved to the basement we had to increase the temp to 100* or they would not begin to hatch until day 28 with many not hatching at all.

 

[Tom Kathleen]

Because your humidity is too high. The egg has to lose around 13 to 15% of its total weight for there to be enough room in the egg for the chick to swing its head to chip out. If they do not lose enough weight the chick is too big and takes up too much room. The other problem is that once the chick internally pips any excess moisture in the egg can drown the chick. It is a delicate balance that you will have to find that works for your locale and your local conditions. Even the room you are using makes a difference. We incubate in our basement now as the room is kept at a steady temperature and humidity. Our settings work best around 40 to 45% humidity and 100* then up the humidity to 60% at hatch. Remember your settings will differ but you will have to find your sweet spot that works for you. Also, the timing of the hatch will dictate the temperature. When we incubated in the living room our temp setting was 99.4* and they would hatch on day 26 as they should, but when we moved to the basement we had to increase the temp to 100* or they would not begin to hatch until day 28 with many not hatching at all.

THANK YOU! This is excellent information and completely different than what the general concensus is online about temp and humidity for peafowl. My son, who has done tons of research before starting this hatch and who has really high hatch rates for guineas and chickens, when I read it to him said "that's really different than everything online" and then I read him all the different types of peafowl you successfully raise and he immediately went down to look at them. This will really help. We really appreciate you taking the time to answer in such excellent detail and your insight will hopefully bode better for the next batch. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Tom Kathleen]

Because your humidity is too high. The egg has to lose around 13 to 15% of its total weight for there to be enough room in the egg for the chick to swing its head to chip out. If they do not lose enough weight the chick is too big and takes up too much room. The other problem is that once the chick internally pips any excess moisture in the egg can drown the chick. It is a delicate balance that you will have to find that works for your locale and your local conditions. Even the room you are using makes a difference. We incubate in our basement now as the room is kept at a steady temperature and humidity. Our settings work best around 40 to 45% humidity and 100* then up the humidity to 60% at hatch. Remember your settings will differ but you will have to find your sweet spot that works for you. Also, the timing of the hatch will dictate the temperature. When we incubated in the living room our temp setting was 99.4* and they would hatch on day 26 as they should, but when we moved to the basement we had to increase the temp to 100* or they would not begin to hatch until day 28 with many not hatching at all.

Follow up question. Son is fuming that all the stuff on the internet is totally wrong. He's candled the remaining 4 eggs that he started with the incorrect internet directions and the air sac is way too small because not enough water has evaporated because the humidity was too high. The newest one is 15 days old, the oldest is 24 days told. He reduced the humidity to 40 percent in hopes that it might help in some way. He's really mad because he read a TON of stuff online and it was incorrect, so he's looking to try to fix it somehow. We realize we might just have to wait until we get a new batch. But right now, these 4 eggs are are STILL ALIVE. His question is:

He's reduced humidity to 40 percent, but would it hurt to reduce it to 30 percent to try and evaporate as much water off as possible before they hatch so they can breathe?

Any other advice on trying to save these 4 would be greatly appreciated by him.

THANK YOU!!!

 

[KsKingBee]

When we teach beekeeping classes we tell our students that everything is relative to location. Almost everything people preach has worked for them, it doesn't mean it is good information or bad, it just might not work for you. Everything you do is an art and takes practice to perfect. There are reasons why things work you just have to find out what will work for you and most importantly in your locale.

Get a gram scale and weigh your eggs before you set them and monitor the weight during the incubation process. You can see by weighing them if you are losing moisture, some people will wait until the last week to either lower or raise the humidity to hit that target goal of 11 to 14% weight loss. Remember that too much of a good thing isn't a good thing. There are charts on how the air sac should look at certain days of incubation on the web, find one for a 28 day egg.

It sounds like you are adding the eggs as you find them, next time wait until you have a clutch and set them all at once as it is easier to regulate the humidity. We set once per week during the season. Do not hold your eggs longer than ten days if possible.

Dad always said 'where there is life there is hope', it is not too late to save your eggs just do not go radicle at this point. If you are hatchng in the same incubator reducing the humidity too much will make that process a bit trickier.

 

[Tom Kathleen]

When we teach beekeeping classes we tell our students that everything is relative to location. Almost everything people preach has worked for them, it doesn't mean it is good information or bad, it just might not work for you. Everything you do is an art and takes practice to perfect. There are reasons why things work you just have to find out what will work for you and most importantly in your locale.

Get a gram scale and weigh your eggs before you set them and monitor the weight during the incubation process. You can see by weighing them if you are losing moisture, some people will wait until the last week to either lower or raise the humidity to hit that target goal of 11 to 14% weight loss. Remember that too much of a good thing isn't a good thing. There are charts on how the air sac should look at certain days of incubation on the web, find one for a 28 day egg.

It sounds like you are adding the eggs as you find them, next time wait until you have a clutch and set them all at once as it is easier to regulate the humidity. We set once per week during the season. Do not hold your eggs longer than ten days if possible.

Dad always said 'where there is life there is hope', it is not too late to save your eggs just do not go radicle at this point. If you are hatchng in the same incubator reducing the humidity too much will make that process a bit trickier.

Thanks! excellent information! All excellent. I agree everyone has different approaches. I think his frustration is that not one single of his sources mentioned monitoring the internal moisture and he would have been doing that (engineering mind. I will let him know about the holding for a clutch. He does that for the guineas and it's much easier. He wasn't able to do that this time for the peafowl because he wanted to get them hatching as soon as possible to see if they were fertile (being the first round of eggs, he didn't think they were even fertile and was suprised they developed!).