Hatching quail questions

[Dieselchick88]

This is my first experience hatching quail, right now I'm on day 16 of incubating coturnix eggs and I've noticed that 2 eggs have pipped.. It's now been a couple of hours since and no progress, should I be concerned?

 

[dc3085]

It can take as many as 30 hours from pip to hatch. 12-24 is quite normal. They have to completely absorb their yolk sac before they come out lest the others pick at it, or development be damaged.

Maybe you aren't even tempted, but I know what it was like when I started, so I'll warn you anyway.

I don't recommend helping chicks hatch, although many disagree with me. Exiting the shell is the first test of the genetic quality of the bird. Don't get me wrong a lot of other factors play into how easy it is for a chick to hatch, but healthy chicks should be able to get out on their own if you incubation was normal. Assisting a hatch is something that has only a reasonable success rate for an experienced hatcher, so if you do end up doing it, don't be upset if the results aren't great. You must also be prepared to euthanize any chicks that you help hatch as they may have developmental problems that are and always were going to be out of your hands.

Assisted hatching is a technique and a reasonable skill can be attained, but you will always lose some of them, and like I said hatching is Darwin's first test for these guys. There is a lot of good knowledge on assisted hatching in the archives so peruse it first, should you decide to try to help.

 

[Dieselchick88]

Thanks for the reply! I don't plan on helping the chicks hatch since everything I read about that advises against it. Wow 12-24 hours that's crazy, at the most I was expecting 8-10 hours. It's been about 10 hours now and there is a little progress but not much....I'm hoping tomorrow will be way more progress. I'm confident that I've kept the temp constant 99.6-100.2 throughout the incubation unless my thermometer is off. But we'll see.....

 

[dc3085]

I've gone into my incubator to throw out the eggs after a hatch and found chicks that had been pipped for what seemed like two whole days, running loose. They kinda wait however long it takes their yolk sac to absorb. It seems like they just pip at first for the fresh air.

 

[Dieselchick88]

So I went and bought a digital themometer/hygrometer with probe and dropped it through the vent hole( I did not open the incubator)the humidity was 69%(inc says 64%) and temp is 99.0( incubator says 99.8). At egg level. Should I up the temp or leave it alone?

 

[dc3085]

Leave it be unless you have a very high quality thermostat. Low temps can cause a slightly late hatch so make sure you wait it out if they aren't hatching right on time.

 

[Dieselchick88]

Update*
I now have 12 little chicks (all doing well) out of 17 eggs, the first egg that pipped died and the other 4 have not hatched, but will give them a couple more days.