Help! Immediate concern, egg hatching as I type.

[affacat]

Ok just watched a bunch of videos with people trying to help. I think I understand my goal - create a full circle of no shell but don't break the membrane.

It looks like this chick has only got the egg cracked halfway around (tho a rather big hole) and more to the middle than the end as I see in the vids.

So... Gonna try to complete the circle in half an hour when my wife gets home. Should I try to remove any membrane or not touch that at all?

 

[affacat]

Ok. Peeled the shell off in a circle around one end, without ripping the membrane.

It is back in incubator cheeping like crazy. It seems to have membrane stuck to one leg and may be stuck elsewhere. Wondering if I need to do more, or how to deal with dried stuck membrane..

 

[SummerTheAnimalGirl]

I do. I posted this thread Tuesday morning and that poor chick is still in her egg. It's cheeping and rolling a bit as we speak.

Ivd read a couple articles and a help thread here that seem to suggest we needed to wait 24 to 48 hours before we help... It's been over that, now.

I also read, though, to be very careful opening the incubator too often to avoid hurting other eggs.

What should I do? Honestly, despite having reas a couple articles I don't totally understand how to help it more than hurt it

 

[SummerTheAnimalGirl]

I am so sorry this is such a tough hatch! But you did the right thing by helping it. How is it doing? Has it got the membrane off? If it struggles for much longer I would help it with the membrane, but most chicks will be able to take it from here. It could of suffered from shrink wrapping. Does it look like that? If So, it will need help taking it off. Did it absorb the whole yolk? How does its umbilical area look?

 

[affacat]

I am so sorry this is such a tough hatch! But you did the right thing by helping it. How is it doing? Has it got the membrane off? If it struggles for much longer I would help it with the membrane, but most chicks will be able to take it from here. It could of suffered from shrink wrapping. Does it look like that? If So, it will need help taking it off. Did it absorb the whole yolk? How does its umbilical area look?

Sorry for the delay, this entire hatch has been emergency after emergency, so I have multiple threads going.

After getting the shell off that poor chick, I waited a bit and then easily peeled the membrane off. The chick had a severely curled foot and splayed legs, but I made a shoe out of cereal box and tape and fix the curled foot overnight. The splayed leg healed on its own.

He now has 2 siblings in his brooder and another hatched in the incubator. We also had a disaster cracked egg with the broody hen, so a potentially dead chick in the brooder but it's still moving in it's cracked shell so I'm at a loss. We also had a major stink bacterial bloom in the incubator so had to emergency clean it. Our second broody quit so we put our second broody on those eggs (we found a dead chick in her original egg batch so had taken all her eggs, now she gets a second chance I guess).

16 more eggs in the brooder (one moving, one pipped, one broken from outside, and others we think are viable ).

We definitely learned how to hatch chicks the hard way

 

[affacat]

Anyone know if I'll be able to give these staggered chicks to a broody hen once her eggs hatch? Or am I raising this staggered batch myself?