Mama was killing chicks as they hatched

[sschroeter]

Mama was killing chicks as they hatched 3 of 11, so we took the remaining eggs out and put them in the bathtub under a heat lamp with a thermometer. One of the eggs we think the mama had punched a hole in so we helped it out (before reading a great thread here on how to do it properly). Another hatched, seemingly normally and was active and alert. Having this one around the other has seemed to cause the first to perk up. It is finally moving after laying for most of the day. There are 2 others pipped and one with a bit bigger hole, I think that is called zipped. The zipped one has been at about the same situation for probably close to 12 hours. It's maybe a half inch by quarter inch hole. An acquaintance on FB told us she had to do this once with just a heat lamp and was successful. I thought humidity was a development issue and we'd be OK at this point, but now I'm worried. I don't have an incubator and probably couldn't get one here until tomorrow afternoon. Keeping the temperature around 100 degrees consistently is a bit of an issue as well. It ranges from 90-110. The two hatched chicks are not moving away from it and are cuddling. Any advice?

 

[chicapee]

Mama was killing chicks as they hatched 3 of 11, so we took the remaining eggs out and put them in the bathtub under a heat lamp with a thermometer. One of the eggs we think the mama had punched a hole in so we helped it out (before reading a great thread here on how to do it properly). Another hatched, seemingly normally and was active and alert. Having this one around the other has seemed to cause the first to perk up. It is finally moving after laying for most of the day. There are 2 others pipped and one with a bit bigger hole, I think that is called zipped. The zipped one has been at about the same situation for probably close to 12 hours. It's maybe a half inch by quarter inch hole. An acquaintance on FB told us she had to do this once with just a heat lamp and was successful. I thought humidity was a development issue and we'd be OK at this point, but now I'm worried. I don't have an incubator and probably couldn't get one here until tomorrow afternoon. Keeping the temperature around 100 degrees consistently is a bit of an issue as well. It ranges from 90-110. The two hatched chicks are not moving away from it and are cuddling. Any advice?

Can you make an incubator from a glass dish covered with saran wrap with a ventilation hole. With a warm moist cloth in the bottom and a light for heat above it. You want the temp to be around 99f.

 

[sschroeter]

OK, I've tried that. Managing temperature with a heat lamp has been tricky. I'm going to aim between 97 and 103 and hope that's close enough. The one with the hole does actually seem to be more active already. Thanks for the idea! Time to go to bed for a couple hours.

 

[sschroeter]

Thanks for the brooder idea. It went well last night, other than I didn't sleep well enough for checking on them.

 

[chicapee]

Thanks for the brooder idea. It went well last night, other than I didn't sleep well enough for checking on them.

How is it going today, how many have hatched and how many left to go? Do you have pics?

 

[sschroeter]

It went well. The last 3 eggs don't show any signs of hatching. No pips or peeps. We only have 1 rooster for 20 hens so it is possible they weren't even fertile or of course some other issue could be present too. The one that was seemingly stuck in progress with a hole for many hours hatched a few hours after I last posted and then two more hatched by morning. Pretty quick really. The first one that we helped seems to be doing well. After reading another thread and learning about the possibility of bacterial infection from hatching too soon I guess we could have to wait several days to see if there was a consequence to how it was hatched. Thanks for asking.