HELP!!!! I only have two days to figure it all out before lockdown!!!

[ChickNanny13]

Here's an "incubation" chart, your guys are on schedule ... Patience
As for the hole you made in the air sac, that's good cause you don't want to harm any blood vessels. @WVduckchick @casportpony

 

[RubyNala97]

thanks!

IF YOU DONT HAVE TIME TO READ A LONG REPLY PLEASE JUST SCROLL DOWN TO THE RED UNDERLINED PART!!! THAT IS MY BIGGEST CONCERN! THANK YOUUUU FOR YOUR TIME AND HELP!


So if i can still see the air cell does that mean it hasn't internally pipped and isn't taking up the entire egg yet?
I see exactly where they are both peking which is why I am confused on his pip near the other end.... it is just membrane underneath, not even broken through all the way. When I candle, that part is next to another part that is beating regularly like a heart or something... I honestly am so confused I have no idea what could be going on!?? maybe twins



i think it's funny i posted this thread on monday freaking out about having no time and yet they still haven't hatched....


I currently have three that have (i think) internally pipped because i can hear them pecking at the shell and i can hear them chirp every once in a while when they really get goin with poking the shell....

(it is currently day 27 and 2 hours, i set a count-up on my phone when I set them)

I have four that look like the first part of that emu picture... I can see the little bulge around where their beaks are, but I am pretty sure they haven't actually broken through the membrane yet because I cannot hear them pecking at all. Since today is day 27 and 2 hours, are these four doomed? Perhaps they're late bloomers? What do you guys think... what is the longest you've gone over your hatch due date and still had successful hatches?

@RubyNala97 @ChickNanny13 @WVduckchick (sorry, yours are the only usernames i know thats why i always tag you)

One has been internally pipped for two full days now and I saw him slowing down on his movement, so I poked as safety hole just in case. Hopefully that is okay to do, he perked up and started pecking more after I had made the hole. It is in the air sac no where near his beak or the edges of the air cell.

Thank you all!!!! I would be a complete and utter mess without BYC and all of the generous help and advice I have received. You are all the best. Have a wonderful Friday and a happy weekend!!

You have to get a pic!! I am not exactly sure what you are talking about. You think you see an internal pip in the aircell but an external pip at the pointy end?? Someone else thought the same thing but I think it was another body part pushing into the aircell. Is it possible it’s not really an external pip? Just get a pic of the external pip that you’re seeing at the pointy end. And each egg has there own timeline so don’t worry about the others yet. Congrats on the action so far!!!

 

[WVduckchick]

Good job doing a safe hole. If it’s been internally pipped for over 24 hours, I would have done that also. But just leave the small hole. Don’t rush now. 28 days is just a guideline. Can be a couple days more or less, so don’t get too hung up on the day count. (And just to confirm, you didn’t count the day set as day 1 did you? Day 1 doesn’t start until 24 hours after setting them)

At this point of being confused how the duckling is positioned, I think you are just going to have to wait for more progress.

Hang in there. They’ve made it this far. You’re in the home stretch!

 

[WeTheWeys]

Good job doing a safe hole. If it’s been internally pipped for over 24 hours, I would have done that also. But just leave the small hole. Don’t rush now. 28 days is just a guideline. Can be a couple days more or less, so don’t get too hung up on the day count. (And just to confirm, you didn’t count the day set as day 1 did you? Day 1 doesn’t start until 24 hours after setting them)

At this point of being confused how the duckling is positioned, I think you are just going to have to wait for more progress.

Hang in there. They’ve made it this far. You’re in the home stretch!

there are four that pipped internally, i heard them pecking. the other three are still moving but i cant hear them pecking yet... but when i made the safe holes in the other ones i could see they were shrink wrapped so i removed part of the shell above the air cell, made sure to get their beaks out, and have been wetting the rest of the membrane... can i use coconut oil or something so that it stays wet for longer? theyre all strong(ish) and cheeping and moving a lot. their heads are through enough that i can see their eyes now and they open and look at me and peep. hard little workers, they wake up every few minutes and push push push and then take a little nap and then do it all again. I see veins in the membrane still so I am hoping they will stay in their shells for a while longer to make sure they absorb the whole yolk sac. the veins are much smaller and wayyyyy less red than this morning so i think that is a good sign of them absorbing? This is only for two of them. The other two, i made the safe holes and their beaks could be seen despite the rest being shrink wrapped so i dampened the membrane and then left them in the bator. one wiggled out of its shell but the membrane and yolk sac are still stuck to his butt . the yolk sac has already decreased in size significantly but not completely. he is in a separate bator with clean towels that i change every couple hours. he hasnt fluffed up but is dry... i think the mucusy stuff from the membrane glued his fluff onto his body. any suggestions?


if the yolk sacs are still attached, do they not need food and water yet or they do?


thanks! pray for me!!

 

[RubyNala97]

Can you post some pics? I know we hear the term “shrinkwrapped” a lot but it’s actually pretty uncommon and often confused with the natural way the membrane forms to the baby at hatch time. I would put the one duckling that hatch with the yolk unabsorbed in a cup or some kind of dish so he can’t move around a lot. You want it to finish absorbing and not break open. And yes, use some kind of lubricant besides water. Coconut oil is fine. Give these guys time. They can breathe so there’s no danger of them suffocating. Now they just need time to absorb the veins and yolk. They don’t need food or water as long as they absorb the yolk. Did you read the guide to assisted hatching?

 

[WeTheWeys]

Can you post some pics? I know we hear the term “shrinkwrapped” a lot but it’s actually pretty uncommon and often confused with the natural way the membrane forms to the baby at hatch time. I would put the one duckling that hatch with the yolk unabsorbed in a cup or some kind of dish so he can’t move around a lot. You want it to finish absorbing and not break open. And yes, use some kind of lubricant besides water. Coconut oil is fine. Give these guys time. They can breathe so there’s no danger of them suffocating. Now they just need time to absorb the veins and yolk. They don’t need food or water as long as they absorb the yolk. Did you read the guide to assisted hatching?

okay so started with 12 eggs on day one and had 7 at hatch time...

basically i candled for the internal pip and listened for pecks. this was days ago, like sunday... i could hear three pecking so i waited for an external pip... i read they take forever so i checked after 24 hours and nothing had changed except the pecking became faster and more forceful. waited another day... in total i waited for two, almost three, days to see even the slightest external pip. nothing. i gave them air holes on tuesday night. meanwhile, the other four eggs started to peck and i gave them air holes as well but gave them until friday for the external pip.

back to the other three...from the air holes i could see they were shrink wrapped. maybe i will post a picture later, but i don't have them on my computer yet as of now. ill describe what it looked like: a very dry, off-white almost light tan color, looked like a wrinkly plastic bag and you could see the faintest outline of the beak underneath when the duckling would try to poke through. I read you shouldn't interfere ever, so I let it go for a while. they died and i assume it is because they couldnt get out to get air. So the other four I assisted by wetting the membrane to make it so I could see if there were veins. I then made a small opening near their beaks and then i wet the membranes again only this time with coconut oil, after the advice given. put them back in the incubator etc etc. they slowly slowly started to pop their heads out but the membranes crusted onto them and they couldnt move. one at a time i used a clean qtip with warm water to wet the crusted stuff so that they could move again. as soon as i did this they wiggled their heads out and then rested a while. Over time they came out. two came out fully with their little yolk thing attached but the yolk itself had separated from it... so it was just a pink ball with a little string at the end.
kept them in a seperate, clean incubator and replaced the towels beneath them practically every 20 min. ive been putting antibiotic ointment on the stringy part. they have scabbed up and no longer leave little marks on the towels. they are sooooooooo much smaller now than when they first hatched... first hatched, they were like walnut (???? idk how big a walnut is but probably the size of a quarter in diameter), now it isnt even spherical it just looks like a mini baboon butt sticking off of it. the middle is scabbed over but i still reapply the antibiotic. the other two are still attached to the lower half of their egg by their yolk sac.

my biggest q is : is there even the slightest chance if them surviving or am i screwed?

also, when will i be able to tell if theyre ok and going to make it or not?

 

[WeTheWeys]

Why were they all shrink wrapped and sticky chicked? here is my incubation process (unless all three of my thermometers and humidity readers were off..? but i calibrated them all with ice at both before incubating, and the day before going into lockdown just to make sure they really read correctly... one read 2º lower than the others so i made sure to pay attention to that as well...

during incubation i had a little bit of water but mainly a dry incubation due to the instability of humidity.... the air cells were detached on all of the eggs except one, and that one turned out to not be fertile anyways...

humidity was 35-40% up until the last few days prior to lockdown where i increased it to 55-65, and then lockdown when i did between 65-75. I wonder if there were fluctuations during the day while i was at work... i hardly got sleep these past two weeks ive been up monitoring the temp and humidity every night. additionally, around week 2 the power went out for a couple hours, but i caught it at 10 minutes of being out (it was at 2am so i thankfully woke up for some reason and was able to rescue them) so i used warm towels and my own body heat to maintain the 37.5º temp in the bator.... the entire time it has been 37.5º, until lockdown where i lowered it to 35.5º, but that and the humidity still fluctuate because of all the hatching....

i just want these poor little babies to be ok