Incubation Problem.. Help!

[DanverGuy]

Hey everyone,

So I've been incubating several batches of eggs over the past few months and I've had a few problems which have led me to post on here. The three breeds I've incubated most are Rhode Island Reds (1 batch of local eggs from neighbor), Sumatras (3 batches shipped from two different sources), and Crevecoeur Eggs (3 batches shipped from the same source). Of the three incubation periods, the first had the most hatch. All of the RIR eggs hatched about 25% of the Sumtra and 25% of the Crev. The last two batches had sumtra and crev eggs. In every hatch with the Sumatra and Crev shipped eggs I have had many chicks that developed to the last three days but either never absorbed the yolk (and died in shell) or absorbed the yolk but for some reason never hatched and died in shell. I lower the temp to about 98.8F during the hatch from 100F during incubation and bump up humidity to 70% (from 55%). Everything is consistent and I use two Hovabator Genesis Incubators. What's going on with these chicks that don't hatch? Could it have something to do with the fact that they were shipped eggs? I thought it was really weird all the local eggs hatched but then there's all these problems getting the others to hatch (the Crev's have the worst hatch rate by far). Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

D'AnverGuy

 

[darkbluespace]

Try searching the forum for dry incubation info. Incubating without water has made all the difference for me. When my humidity was too high, my chicks grew too large to be able to pip and zip open the shell. Those aren't terrible numbers for shipped eggs, but less humidity could help. With no water at all my humidity is around 30 % and I keep the vents open to try to get it a little lower.

 

[spotsplus]

The unabsorbed yolk chicks could mean that the chick had an infection or temps were off during incubation or could even be that the chick genetically wasn't 100% as it should be. You do want to keep your temps at 99.5 even during hatching. Shipped eggs typically only have about 40-50% hatch rates- a lot depends on how the post office handled them on the way. Glad to hear the RIRs all hatched. I'm not surprised that they did so well as they were local.