Hatching Trouble- Dead at Hatching Time

[ayschmidt]

I recently set 8 eggs in the incubator and come hatch day I had 3 beautiful babies hatch free and clear. I had another external pip through the shell and expected to see a new addition in the morning. When I woke up I was sad to see that the little one died in the night and never made it out of the shell. I waited 2 more days to see if any of the others would hatch.... No such luck. I decided to crack open the eggs and see what could have possibly went wrong and I was sad to find that 4 more babies had died right before hatching. One I could tell had died around day 19 because the yolk had not absorbed completely but the others seemed to be completely grown and fine but they just never hatched. What could have happened to my fuzzy butts that made this happen when they were so close to hatching?

 

[ozexpat]

I recently set 8 eggs in the incubator and come hatch day I had 3 beautiful babies hatch free and clear. I had another external pip through the shell and expected to see a new addition in the morning. When I woke up I was sad to see that the little one died in the night and never made it out of the shell. I waited 2 more days to see if any of the others would hatch.... No such luck. I decided to crack open the eggs and see what could have possibly went wrong and I was sad to find that 4 more babies had died right before hatching. One I could tell had died around day 19 because the yolk had not absorbed completely but the others seemed to be completely grown and fine but they just never hatched. What could have happened to my fuzzy butts that made this happen when they were so close to hatching?

there could be numerous issues

these include temperature regulation, infection of eggs, lack of ventilation and humidity issues through hatch.

all of these are exacerbated by using shipped eggs

most instructions that come with incubators say to incubate with a humidity at around 45-50%. This does not seem to work for the back yard chickener,

the dry hatching method seems to work way better - see the hatching 101 guide in my signature below to see how most of us achieve success.

i am sorry for your loss. dont give up

 

[sdm111]

Sounds like Humidity too high during days 1 - 18. Chicks grew too large and either drowned at internal pip or could not turn once external pip

 

[ayschmidt]

Ok thank you for the insight. They were not shipped eggs, they were just eggs out of the coop. I worried that there was not enough humidity, but with only 8 eggs in the incubator maybe I had to much going. I just set 24 more and I will have to adjust down a little. I am not sure this is entirely the problem though because I am kinda bad about adding water. I always turn at least twice a day but I sometimes skimp on adding water and it did go dry in there a couple of times. Could the changes in the humidity be the problem? It is a still air incubator does that make a difference?

 

[ozexpat]

Ok thank you for the insight. They were not shipped eggs, they were just eggs out of the coop. I worried that there was not enough humidity, but with only 8 eggs in the incubator maybe I had to much going. I just set 24 more and I will have to adjust down a little. I am not sure this is entirely the problem though because I am kinda bad about adding water. I always turn at least twice a day but I sometimes skimp on adding water and it did go dry in there a couple of times. Could the changes in the humidity be the problem? It is a still air incubator does that make a difference?

dont bother adding water at all until day 18

see how you go

Dry incubation is much more successful

 

[ayschmidt]

Thank you I read up on that today and since I already had some water in there I will let it evaporate and see where that gets me. Thanks again.

 

[ayschmidt]

One of the sweet babies that did hatch! Fluffy Butt Lucky Mutt