moorhen eggs help?

[Weirdness555]

Hi, we live on a river bank and our local moorhen breeds by our house every year. This year, she's had no luck. Her first clutch was washed away in a storm, and she laid another. She's been on them for 3 weeks, and today I went to check on her and found her dead in the water. I waded out and the eggs were cold, dad is nowhere to be seen. We had a dead duck in the water a few days ago also, so I don't know if they're related, but I now have a nest of 5 cold moorhen eggs. Apparently they incubate for ~20 days (19-23 days seen on different sites), so they should have been ready to hatch any day now. I've brought them in and put them in my brinsea mini, I candled some and I can see a dark mass in the eggs which makes sense as there should be whole chicks in there. I couldn't see any movement, but they were cold at the time. Any advice? She can only have been dead for a day max, any idea if there's still a chance of them hatching?

 

[sumi]

Unless they got very, very cold they should be o.k. still. I'd say keep them warm in the incubator for another 3 days or so and fingers crossed! At this late stage, just before hatching, they are so far along and the space in the egg so cramped, it's unlikely that you'll see any movement or signs of life until they start hatching. Good luck and please keep us posted!

 

[Weirdness555]

Some of the eggs are moving! I think we must have at least 2 alive, and probably 2 others which look like they have moved but I haven't seen them move. There's only one which I haven't seen any signs of movement from. Fingers crossed they all make it out of the egg. I'm a bit worried that they're moving but there's no pips yet

 

[Weirdness555]

First two eggs have pipped!

 

[Weirdness555]

Eggs are in the process of hatching, but the water in the well to keep the humidity up is disappearing fast. I can't refill it without opening the incubator, but I don't want to shrink wrap my chicks. Any advice?

 

[Weirdness555]

The chicks are cheeping away inside the eggs, but haven't made much progress past pipping. There's no hole, just a break point where the shell is pushed out. They've been pipped since 12pm yesterday, and they've made 2 more pushed out bits each, but no visible holes or zips. There's no way to check the humidity, but the guidelines said to fill both halves of the well for hatching which I did. Should I be worried? It's been 30 hours since pip now

 

[Weirdness555]

Please help I don't know what to do should I assist? It's been nearly 36 hours since pip, birds are still chirping in shells but making no progress

 

[Sea2Ski]

I wish I could help you, but I have no idea what the right thing is to do.
Bump for someone else to assist!!