Yup! Rozzie has 9!
It was a stressful hatch for some of the babies, but they are doing okay.
The first four babies did pretty well. Pipping (but not removing a chunk of shell) started at 8 yesterday morning. Baby 1 hatched before 3:30 yesterday afternoon. I moved him / her to the brooder late last night. Baby 2& 3 hatched overnight between midnight and 5 am. I moved them at about 5:30 AM. Baby 4 hatched sometime between 7:30 and 9:30 AM. (Long enough that he was mostly dry then.) Moved it by 10.
The worry with this hatch was that beginning with the first one that I moved I was smelling a foul stench when opening the incubator. However, I didn't know WHAT it was coming from. I couldn't narrow it down. It only got worse with each of the next two removals to the brooder. The off gassing of whatever egg was rotting was starting to effect the other chicks. They had over 26 hours before and were now stopping chirruping and didn't seem to be trying to get out of their eggs anymore. I'll admit to having helped some of the remainder of the eggs pip. They were in danger and these eggs weren't being left to die at this point. (I know. Personal decision, though. I was willing to risk the curled toes and other problems.)
So, I did assist VERY carefully (I have a very light touch). I ended up only providing minimal assistance for two of the remaining five, a larger bit of assistance to one more (a bigger pip), and major help to two others. One of the ones I provided only a tiny help to has a couple of curled toes but gets around okay. The last one to hatch was shrink wrapped. I actually suspect this started with him from early in the hatch. It appeared that one of the other chicks had knocked a piece of outer shell off -- it was not broken inside of it. This was on the back of the egg, so I hadn't seen it to keep it moist. He had a hard hatch and horribly curled feet. I had to choose to cull or to bandage the feet. I've got old Pokemon bandages on his feet now. He couldn't walk AT ALL but is now getting around pretty good.
Oh, and the last egg I picked up was the bad one. What I thought was a pip wasn't a pip. It was a near eggsplosion. When I went to help it pip...well, let's say it wasn't pretty. No wonder the incubator reeked.
So, I started by keeping the early, strong hatchers separate. Next, I added the 3 stronger of the remaining five. One of the others was smaller and weaker than the rest. I kept him (Tiny) and Boots separate until a bit later. I have moved them from the hospital brooder to the main brooder and all seems well. I'm watching that they don't peck at Boots feet since he is wearing bandaids.
Pictures to follow...
Ended up with 9 babies from an initial set of 20 eggs.
15 were shipped eggs - of those, 9 made it to lockdown, and 8 hatched. I'm very happy with that rate. (Thanks Alexandra!!! Your eggs did great.)
5 were my eggs. Mr. Roo hasn't been very busy lately, and I figured I wouldn't have good luck with those. 1 made it to lockdown and 1 hatched. Pretty sure its the weaker one I'm calling "Tiny" but not positive...
