Help! One of my chicks in the incubator hatched 3 days b4 it was due.

[Lesserevil]

Should I leave it in there a day more and take it out? It must have hatched last night cuz it's almost dry. It's on day 3 so I'm supposed to take out the turning tray today. Should I put it by itself in the brooder when I take out the turning tray? I've never had a chick hatch 3/4 days b4 the date.

 

[Kiki]

The sooner you take it out and put it in a warm brooder with warm water and food to eat the better.

Your temps must be too high to have it hatch days early.

Get some of these:
https://www.googleadservices.com/pa...8LszYmLAxWQ8MkDHY3dDngQ9aACKAB6BAgJECo&adurl=

 

[Lesserevil]

The sooner you take it out and put it in a warm brooder with warm water and food to eat the better.

Your temps must be too high to have it hatch days early.

Get some of these:
https://www.googleadservices.com/pa...8LszYmLAxWQ8MkDHY3dDngQ9aACKAB6BAgJECo&adurl=

Ok will do. Temps were 99.5 for the whole time. It's an automatic incubator. Also for some reason I click on that and it's sending me to a dead page.

 

[Kiki]

Ok will do. Temps were 99.5 for the whole time. It's an automatic incubator. Also for some reason I click on that and it's sending me to a dead page.

Were you trusting the reading on your incubator? They are usually wrong.

Always purchase seperate thermometers and calibrate them.


Weird...the link works for me:

 

[Kiki]

Does this work for you?
https://www.amazon.com/Govee-Hygrom...54c63c327eb6c11a03e7c6ba30&tag=hyprod-20&th=1

 

[Lesserevil]

I did calibrate. That's why I'm confused as to why this chick hatched early but the other 22 eggs are still unhatched.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Before they hatch a chick absorbs the yolk. They can live more than 72 hours on that yolk so they do not need to eat or drink in that time. You can leave it in longer if you wish or you can take it out now. Your choice, as long as it is out by 72 hours after hatch. If you take it out and it is by itself you might put a small mirror in there so its reflection can keep it company. (I'd take it out when you go into lockdown.)

It sounds like this is not your first time hatching. There are different things that can cause an egg to hatch early. The best known one is that the incubating temperature is too high. Is it possible there was a hot spot in your incubator?

Heredity, humidity, and just differences in the eggs can cause them to hatch early or late. Mine tend to hatch a couple of days early, whether in a calibrated incubator or under a broody hen, I think because of heredity. Four days early is very early though. I'm not sure any of these would cause that much of a difference but it is always possible.

I keep reading in this forum that small eggs can hatch earlier than larger eggs. That does not work for mine. I've marked them and paid attention to when they hatch. It has not made any difference with mine but we all have different experiences. I do not dispute that this might cause a difference with some eggs.

Where did you get the eggs? How were they stored before incubation started? Is it possible one egg was at incubation temperatures for a couple of days before they went in the incubator? To me this is most logical but I don't know if it is possible.

You may never know why it happened. But it obviously did so you need to deal with the consequences.

Good luck!

 

[Lesserevil]

Before they hatch a chick absorbs the yolk. They can live more than 72 hours on that yolk so they do not need to eat or drink in that time. You can leave it in longer if you wish or you can take it out now. Your choice, as long as it is out by 72 hours after hatch. If you take it out and it is by itself you might put a small mirror in there so its reflection can keep it company. (I'd take it out when you go into lockdown.)

It sounds like this is not your first time hatching. There are different things that can cause an egg to hatch early. The best known one is that the incubating temperature is too high. Is it possible there was a hot spot in your incubator?

Heredity, humidity, and just differences in the eggs can cause them to hatch early or late. Mine tend to hatch a couple of days early, whether in a calibrated incubator or under a broody hen, I think because of heredity. Four days early is very early though. I'm not sure any of these would cause that much of a difference but it is always possible.

I keep reading in this forum that small eggs can hatch earlier than larger eggs. That does not work for mine. I've marked them and paid attention to when they hatch. It has not made any difference with mine but we all have different experiences. I do not dispute that this might cause a difference with some eggs.

Where did you get the eggs? How were they stored before incubation started? Is it possible one egg was at incubation temperatures for a couple of days before they went in the incubator? To me this is most logical but I don't know if it is possible.

You may never know why it happened. But it obviously did so you need to deal with the consequences.

Good luck!

Thank you! They're actually my fave hen's eggs,so they be half Cochin half Easter egger. Our roosters fought off a huge cane corso that's been going around attacking livestock in the area (backyard breeders, animal control is about to shut them down) Damn dog ripped open our very well built run until I came out with my pew pew, the rooster seemed like he wasnt going to make it and he's the best rooster I've ever had so I gathered up her eggs so I can have some of his offspring. And surprise surprise, he pulled through. Had to stitch him up, but made it. Also the hen, not broody at all so she would sit on them for like an hour and then go about her little bearded business.

 

[Susan Skylark]

In cattle they can select for ‘calving ease’ bulls, or rather bulls that throw calves with a shorter gestation, basically they are cutting days, maybe even weeks off of gestation and since the calf grows significantly each day, you get smaller calves. Wouldn’t surprise me if birds had a similar gene plus or minus a hot corner of the incubator. I have quail so they only get 24 hours in the incubator but I don’t like leaving them in there for longer than a couple hours. Part of the reason is my incubator runs 80 percent humidity and the chicks never get dry. The other is pathogen exposure. Ever notice we culture bacteria in an incubator in the lab? Yeah, a bird incubator has the exact same conditions: warm, humid and organic material (food). So if you haven’t thoroughly sanitized your eggs and incubator before incubating, having vulnerable babies flopping around and going beak first into something nasty. I’m a neophyte incubator, started last spring with shipped eggs, I faithfully kept the little buggers in there 12-24 hours for fear of shrink wrapping. Also had 20 percent death loss in the brooder by day 3 in both batches. They just never grew and then died. Working diagnosis is a clostridium: spore forming bacteria ubiquitous in soil and feces, produces a toxin that kills before you see any symptoms save malaise and belly pain in some cases. I was feeding a 30 percent protein starter but I switched to 21 percent (quail) mostly for local availability but also clostridium multiplies rapidly in the presence of excess nutrients or the absence of competitive bacteria (normal GI flora gets wiped out by antibiotics, ever heard of C. Difficile?). The only other change I made was getting chicks out of the incubator within a couple hours. And using home raised eggs. And yes, I do clean the incubator between batches. I’ve hatched 10 or so batches since last spring and now have had 0 brooder chick mortality. Chicks weakened by shipping, ration too ‘hot,’ too long in a contaminated incubator, a complete fluke? Who knows, but at least I can move on to puzzling out something else!