Hatching chick, piped in a diff. spot than the others, leaked a clear yellow fluid, a little blood,A

[Peeperscreepers]

@WVduckchick @EggSighted4Life
Sorry to bother you guys again but how long do you leave eggs in after lockdown till you toss them? I still have a couple in there but there are no external pips or rocking or chirping. I would hate to throw them out and be chicks in them. This evening at 6 pm will be 2 days past day 0. I would candle them but maran eggs are pretty dark. The light cream/whiteish eggs that are BLRW are so easy to candle compared.

 

[EggSighted4Life]

@WVduckchick @EggSighted4Life
Sorry to bother you guys again but how long do you leave eggs in after lockdown till you toss them? I still have a couple in there but there are no external pips or rocking or chirping. I would hate to throw them out and be chicks in them. This evening at 6 pm will be 2 days past day 0. I would candle them but maran eggs are pretty dark. The light cream/whiteish eggs that are BLRW are so easy to candle compared.

For me personally I would ditch the whole day zero count down thing and make sure you have your calendar marked... start associating with day 21 and such... a power outage can likely kill your countdown timer accuracy.

You aren't a bother... we are all here because we wan't to be and trust me we GET a payoff also or we wouldn't do it.

How long I let things go after day 21 depends on how the incubation itself went.. like if there were power outages or if I didn't move eggs to a new location in the bator daily to combat uneven development, EVEN in my forced air bators temp differences do exist, I will wait longer like until day 25. It also depends on how long since my last pip/hatch.. I'm a hard arss so I often have moved on by day 23... as anything else simply isn't fitting in and survival of the fittest (to a degree) is how I manage my flock to keep it strong. But also, I have RARELY had anything hatch after that... and late hatches have lower viability... seeing the difference that JUST a few hours makes in strength... it's kinda amazing anything survives in nature.

Very dark eggs are difficult, not just brown but blue! But I can usually manage to make out at least the air cell. So I look into the air cell for any shadows moving... if I see movement in the air cell I wait... If it were my first hatch I would probably wait until about day 25... it's only through knowing my flock and hatch routine that I can now make the earlier calls, confidently.

I would suggest using a plastic baggy to open them in when you do toss them... just to see if you had any development at all... It's taken a good couple years of practice to be able to throw out the earlier quitters.

Also... another thing In have done at this late stage is pierce the air cell end of the egg and see what's going on inside... most often they had previously expired. Only once did I accidentally open an embryo, but was much earlier in incubation and much farther behind in development than others... I knew it looked like it had something going on... I feed my early quitters back to the animals... and there was an eyeball looking at me while I scrambled the eggs!

Water candling doesn't hold much stock to me.

My answer... not before day 23 if inexperienced... and not later than day 26 otherwise... I NEVER had any chicken egg hatch or be viable after that.... The sniff test *can* clue you in... stink is permeable, though I haven't experienced many eggs that actually did rot even if they quit early and stayer for the entire incubation.

Next thing I know... you'll be giving me hatching advice!

 

[WVduckchick]

Didn’t get that last tag.

I totally agree with EggSighted.

Another rule of thumb for me is about 48 hours from first hatch to last hatch...for same breeds, set at the same time, etc.
For dark eggs, get a really bright light (300+ lumens) with fresh batteries! I can usually make out air cells at least. If the air cell hasn’t drawn down by 48 hours after the first chick hatched, they were likely either infertile or DIS.