I'm about to pass out with excitement!!!

[SqueakyRoseShalom]

I have four eggs that have just begun to crack! My first hatch!!!! I'm beyond excited!!!! So how long until they emerge completely from the egg?!!!! I have been checking the incubator every five minutes for the past two hours and i realize that i had better pace myself! But seriously, HOW LONG?!!!!!!

 

[DylansMom]

I have four eggs that have just begun to crack! My first hatch!!!! I'm beyond excited!!!! So how long until they emerge completely from the egg?!!!! I have been checking the incubator every five minutes for the past two hours and i realize that i had better pace myself! But seriously, HOW LONG?!!!!!!

Deep breaths now, can't have anyone passing out from excitement!

When they hatch the first thing that happens is usually the "pip" this is a little crack or hole they break in the shell to let air in. After the pip they will usually take a break and rest up for the final lap, during this rest period they are absorbing the yolk sac into the body, so be patient. This break in the action can last a few hours or 2 days, just depends on the chick, so yes....pace yourself. When they are ready for the final breakout they will start to enlarge the pip in a line around the shell, we call this unzipping and it generally goes pretty fast. So bottom line is from pip to zip can be several hour or it can be 2 days, any longer and I would be worried. Good job incubating!

 

[AmyLynn2374]

Ya, you better pace yourself...lol between pip to zip can take anywhere from 4 hours to 24 hours. My last hatched averaged between 12-18 hours from pip to zip. I had a couple earlier and a couple that took longer.

 

[SqueakyRoseShalom]

THANKS FOR RESPONDING!!!! When no one responded in the first thirty minutes I really did think that I was going to pass out!

BWAHAHAHAAA! I was going from the incubator to the computer then back to the incubator and then back to the 'puter and back..... Oh dear

Geez Louise I can't even imagine what someone without chickens must think of us! Thanks for the encouragement! Breathe in, breathe out.... I haven't even told the kids yet!

 

[AmyLynn2374]

You have a long night ahead of you!! lol

 

[dheltzel]

Maybe we should setup a system where first time hatchers get a "sponsor" they can call when things get tough! Really, 30 minutes could have been too much for many people in that situation.

If over the next few days, you find yourself tempted to "help", please reach out to one of us so we can talk you down. I've hatched hundreds of chicks (584 so far in 2015) and it's still hard to wait for them to finish. Sometimes I do help them at the end of the hatch, but those are generally lost anyway, I just feel I must give them a chance, even if it's slim. That said, helping them too early is a death sentence for an otherwise healthy chick, and once they start bleeding, it's too late and you feel awful, so I've learned to wait until they are clearly going to perish without help.

 

[DylansMom]

THANKS FOR RESPONDING!!!! When no one responded in the first thirty minutes I really did think that I was going to pass out!

BWAHAHAHAAA! I was going from the incubator to the computer then back to the incubator and then back to the 'puter and back..... Oh dear

Geez Louise I can't even imagine what someone without chickens must think of us! Thanks for the encouragement! Breathe in, breathe out.... I haven't even told the kids yet!

When my first eggs were getting ready to hatch I almost kept my kid home from school to wait with me!

 

[AmyLynn2374]

When my first eggs were getting ready to hatch I almost kept my kid home from school to wait with me!

We homeschool....the first hatch was actually a "science project" for our oviparious animal study. We didn't even plan to keep chicks!! Yeah, boy do plans change.....40 eggs in the bator w/38 I'm pretty sure are still developing.....lol Getting ready to redo the coop so these that spent the winter inside can go out!!

 

[dheltzel]

We homeschool....the first hatch was actually a "science project" for our oviparious animal study. We didn't even plan to keep chicks!! Yeah, boy do plans change.....40 eggs in the bator w/38 I'm pretty sure are still developing.....lol Getting ready to redo the coop so these that spent the winter inside can go out!!

I loaned an incubator with eggs to 3 homeschool families last year and 2 of them kept the chicks and build coops in their backyards. It turns out to be quite hard to let those little ones go back to the farm after you raised them for a few weeks.

 

[AmyLynn2374]

I loaned an incubator with eggs to 3 homeschool families last year and 2 of them kept the chicks and build coops in their backyards. It turns out to be quite hard to let those little ones go back to the farm after you raised them for a few weeks.

Extremely!! I had "borrowed" my sister's incubator......I still have my "sister's" bator. lol I told her she might not get it back and if she wanted any eggs hatched let me know....lol It was eggs from her flock too.