Helping an egg with a detached air cell

[agordon]

Egg #9 has been a mess. Our hen went broody. I candled 12 eggs, 8 were good. We had 2 that were questionable. I candled those 2 eggs 6 days later and both looked good. But we now had 9 eggs. And #9 was developing already. Likely 3-4 days along. I arranged for an incubator, but another hen went broody, so we put the egg under her. We candled the egg half way and the air cell had detached. Free floating. We now have an egg that has continued to develop and is due to hatch Monday or Tuesday. I candled tonight and the egg is solid dark. No air cell at all. Obviously this is a bad thing. The chick might be able to externally pip to breath. That does happen from what I read.

My Question: Should I carefully make a rescue hole where the air cell should have been the day before we expect the chick to hatch? I am concerned about not helping, as it has no air cell. I am concerned about helping, because we are not 100% sure if the chick is day 19 it 20 this Sunday. I don't want to make a rescue hole too soon and the membranes dry out. Also, with no air cell, their could be veins everywhere. Their might not be a safe spot to put a rescue hole. What to do? I feel like a very carefully made rescue hole is probably the best way to help this particular chick.

The other 8 eggs all hatched! We have had excellent hatch rates this year. Thus far all 13 fertilized eggs from 2 broods have hatched.

 

[JaeG]

I recently had one that ended up with a strip of air cell down one side of the egg as well as the usual one at the top. This chick pipped straight out at the narrow end of the egg, perhaps positioning itself near the strip of air cell rather than the one at the fat end. That strip of air cell pretty much disappeared as the chick got close to hatching so there may be a pocket somewhere that you just can't see because of where it is and where the chick is.

If it were me I'd cross my fingers and just see what happens. It's risky making a safety hole because you could hit a vein or the chick with no large air cell space to safely make the hole in. Removing some of the shell is another option, but you may not be able to work out which end of the chick is which with only that small window and, again, with no air cell to aim for you could make the chick bleed by disturbing the membrane as you take some of the shell off. And then there's the question of timing. To me there's more risk of doing damage than actually helping, so I'm crossing my fingers for your little chick and hopefully that will do the trick.