I intervened too soon and now scared the chicks won’t make it.

[junie-chicks]

Please help, this is my first time with hatching chicks and I am caring for them for my parents while they’re away.

I had two eggs that had pipped slightly yesterday but come today they still hadn’t made progress, so I attempted to widen the hole a bit more and revealed their beaks through the shell this morning. I left them for a while and kept checking, but they seemed to go quite still and I was concerned about shrink wrapping because the humidity in the incubator we have is not stable at all and struggles to get above 60%.

This evening I took away some more shell and dampened the membranes with some water, and tried peeling them back a bit more in case the chicks were stuck. One had membrane that was brown and very stuck to them. But when peeling back some membrane I caused it to bleed slightly and now have completely stopped interfering, but I’m so worried they won’t make it. I have taken quite a bit of shell off and exposed them quite a bit, but clearly they aren’t ready yet and I may have compromised them.

Please help, any advice is appreciated. I’m beside myself in tears worrying I’ve hurt them. Thank you.

 

[kattabelly]

Are you able to take a photo without taking them out of the incubator?

I think all you can really do is try to keep the humidity up enough to stop them getting stuck when they are ready. Someone might be able to give more advice if you say which incubator you're using. Adding a little container of water (covered in some way so it can still evaporate but newly hatched chicks can't fall in and drown) or something like a wet piece of (clean!) sponge in a dish should help up the humidity.

Some people also use things like coconut oil on the membrane to keep it moist. A warm, wet paper towel can work too but you need to be careful not to cover the whole egg so the chick can't breathe, and ime paper towels need re-wetting quite frequently. Something like cling film (I think it's called saran wrap in the US?) might work after carefully wetting the membrane just enough that it's not sticking but not so much that excess water is entering the egg - again you'd need to be careful not to wrap the whole egg and suffocate the chick, or wrap so much that it can't hatch when ready. I haven't tried that last method myself though.

Whatever you do, give your hands a good wash before touching the eggs at all.

Do you know how many days they've been incubating for?

 

[junie-chicks]

Not a great photo but you can see how open they are, I feel very stupid for opening them up so much.

The one at the back bled slightly and has the brown/tight membrane. I think they are exactly 3 weeks now. Not moving much at all and I’ve probably weakened them a whole lot with all my meddling…

Should I leave them overnight and see how they progress? I’ve moved them to a different incubator which says it is around 69% humidity at the moment. Worried about messing with them any more than I have.

 

[junie-chicks]

Are you able to take a photo without taking them out of the incubator?

I think all you can really do is try to keep the humidity up enough to stop them getting stuck when they are ready. Someone might be able to give more advice if you say which incubator you're using. Adding a little container of water (covered in some way so it can still evaporate but newly hatched chicks can't fall in and drown) or something like a wet piece of (clean!) sponge in a dish should help up the humidity.

Some people also use things like coconut oil on the membrane to keep it moist. A warm, wet paper towel can work too but you need to be careful not to cover the whole egg so the chick can't breathe, and ime paper towels need re-wetting quite frequently. Something like cling film (I think it's called saran wrap in the US?) might work after carefully wetting the membrane just enough that it's not sticking but not so much that excess water is entering the egg - again you'd need to be careful not to wrap the whole egg and suffocate the chick, or wrap so much that it can't hatch when ready. I haven't tried that last method myself though.

Whatever you do, give your hands a good wash before touching the eggs at all.

Do you know how many days they've been incubating for?

sorry I tried to reply to this but just added an extra message to the post, hopefully you can see it!

 

[kattabelly]

Not a great photo but you can see how open they are, I feel very stupid for opening them up so much.

The one at the back bled slightly and has the brown/tight membrane. I think they are exactly 3 weeks now. Not moving much at all and I’ve probably weakened them a whole lot with all my meddling…

Should I leave them overnight and see how they progress? I’ve moved them to a different incubator which says it is around 69% humidity at the moment. Worried about messing with them any more than I have.
View attachment 4171895

Are they making any chewing kind of movements? If they are, that's a sign that they're still absorbing the yolk and not quite ready to hatch yet.

If the membranes are looking a bit dry I'd maybe wet them and then quickly close the inc before leaving them overnight to see what happens. I live somewhere pretty damp though, so opening and closing the incubator isn't so much of a risk when my house almost never drops below 65% and is usually higher. Do you know the humidity of the room the incubator is in?

Please don't beat yourself up over this. You were put in a difficult position, being left to care for the eggs at hatch time when you've never done this before, and you did what you thought was best to help them. There's a lot that can go wrong and it sometimes isn't possible to tell exactly what's happening or what the best course of action is. I'm usually pretty hands-on with incubator hatches and the one time recently that I convinced myself not to intervene, the chick died after pipping despite looking perfectly healthy when I opened it up after.

There's a great article here about assisted hatches that it might be helpful to read.

 

[SnackMeat]

I would also crank the heat. When you remove the air sac like that the chick itself gets colder. I use a laser temp gun and have been in your position. And had my other eggs at 99-100, and then the opened eggs be between 88-93*. If those are the only eggs left, crank the heat. If you have others, put these directly under the fan moving the heat and put coconut oil or Neosporin on the membrane and then cover what you can (not the beak section) with a wet paper towel (wet with hot water and then quickly wrung out so you don't drown the chick and then laid on half the membrane.

I have also found taking a clean ankle sock and folding it down to make a tight nest and putting the egg in it helps with temp. I normally vertically incubate but you should be able to do this with a slightly horizontal egg so long as the sock isn't pressing inward on the membrane.

 

[junie-chicks]

Are they making any chewing kind of movements? If they are, that's a sign that they're still absorbing the yolk and not quite ready to hatch yet.

If the membranes are looking a bit dry I'd maybe wet them and then quickly close the inc before leaving them overnight to see what happens. I live somewhere pretty damp though, so opening and closing the incubator isn't so much of a risk when my house almost never drops below 65% and is usually higher. Do you know the humidity of the room the incubator is in?

Please don't beat yourself up over this. You were put in a difficult position, being left to care for the eggs at hatch time when you've never done this before, and you did what you thought was best to help them. There's a lot that can go wrong and it sometimes isn't possible to tell exactly what's happening or what the best course of action is. I'm usually pretty hands-on with incubator hatches and the one time recently that I convinced myself not to intervene, the chick died after pipping despite looking perfectly healthy when I opened it up after.

There's a great article here about assisted hatches that it might be helpful to read.

thank you so much, I checked this morning and one has hatched but the other with the bloody membrane is still holding tight in there. When I was rewetting the membrane just now, it was opening and closing its beak quite fast so not a chewing motion but sort of. It’s wriggling around a bit but not making a visible attempt to struggle free at the moment.

The room isn’t the most humid I think so trying to keep it as moist as possible in the incubator.

 

[junie-chicks]

I would also crank the heat. When you remove the air sac like that the chick itself gets colder. I use a laser temp gun and have been in your position. And had my other eggs at 99-100, and then the opened eggs be between 88-93*. If those are the only eggs left, crank the heat. If you have others, put these directly under the fan moving the heat and put coconut oil or Neosporin on the membrane and then cover what you can (not the beak section) with a wet paper towel (wet with hot water and then quickly wrung out so you don't drown the chick and then laid on half the membrane.

I have also found taking a clean ankle sock and folding it down to make a tight nest and putting the egg in it helps with temp. I normally vertically incubate but you should be able to do this with a slightly horizontal egg so long as the sock isn't pressing inward on the membrane.

Thank you, will trying wrapping it slightly. I’ll try to see if we have coconut oil available too

 

[SnackMeat]

Neosporin without pain reliever is good. Probably olive oil. Vaseline in a pinch. Just something to keep the membrane soft so long as the beak is poking out of it.

 

[kattabelly]

thank you so much, I checked this morning and one has hatched but the other with the bloody membrane is still holding tight in there. When I was rewetting the membrane just now, it was opening and closing its beak quite fast so not a chewing motion but sort of. It’s wriggling around a bit but not making a visible attempt to struggle free at the moment.

The room isn’t the most humid I think so trying to keep it as moist as possible in the incubator.

I'm so glad one has hatched ok!

Don't take it out of the incubator just for this, but if the other one hasn't hatched by now and you're handling it again anyway to keep the membrane soft you could try seeing if you can see around the chick's navel area to see if there's anything yolky or umbilical looking still. (Don't remove any more shell or membrane or try to reposition the chick, just see if it's unfolded enough that you can see anything the way it is now. Using the torch on your phone or similar might help.)