Lost chicks at day 14

[carsonsurgalski]

Hi!
I was incubating chicken eggs with my kids at school. They were predicted to hatch last Tuesday but we called it quits today, a full 7 days after the predicted hatch. When I cracked open the eggs I found that the majority of them we lost around day 14. They had a beak, a body, an eye, and stubs for legs. Any explanation for why this may have happened? I kept the incubator at school over night and over the weekends. But there was never a big temperature drop around day 14 or at all. My humidity was consistently around 40-45%. I'd love to do this project again - but the next time I want to prevent this from happening! Thank you for all your advice!

 

[Chick-N-Fun]

Did you turn the eggs everyday?? I am a teacher as well and incubate every year with my class. I use an automatic egg turner so that I don’t have to open the incubator daily nor run to school over the weekends.

 

[LaurEliz]

How many did you have? Was someone there at the weekends to turn the eggs for those days?

 

[Chick-N-Fun]

I always incubate between 12-18. I use an automatic egg turner so I don’t have to go in on the weekends to turn them 3-4x per day.

 

[LaurEliz]

I use this website a lot to see what's going on with eggs I'm incubating. This page highlights that they are porous at this point. Maybe they got some sort of bacteria? I'm not sure.

 

[carsonsurgalski]

Did you turn the eggs everyday?? I am a teacher as well and incubate every year with my class. I use an automatic egg turner so that I don’t have to open the incubator daily nor run to school over the weekends.

Yes I have an egg turner too!