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- #11
Aww too cute! The humidity is up to 65 right. After I let my dogs out I will see if we got a baby! Thank you so much! I'm eggcited!Yes, now realize we have only done this one time...but we read so many articles here for over a year and then did what we felt was best. But here's what happens: The chick is "poked" into internal pipping because she is ready to hatch and needs to breathe. The build up of carbon dioxide tells her to move and when she raises her head and pushes against the membrane (the thing that causes so much trouble when you're trying to peel a hard boiled egg) the little egg tooth on the tip of her beak pierces the membrane. Then, her head can reach up into the air cell and she can breathe! Pretty exciting!! Now she can cheep and call to the mama hen and the rest of her clutch. I have read that a mama hen hears this and knows there is/are more babies to come and they cluck back in encouragement.
Doing all this is exhausting for a tiny baby, and they rest a lot. In a normal hatching, they will next start to peck at the inside of the shell. This is the "external pip". You see a tiny crack pushing out. If all goes well, the baby keeps pecking at this and resting and pecking until they finally make (zip) a little "connect the dots" of holes all around the top and then out crawls a wet, scraggly, ....well, here. Let me show you. (see pic) That was our first one, still in the incubator.
Like I said, this is exhausting, and can take a long time. Keep your humidity up because the membrane CAN dry out and do what they call "shrink wrapping" and cling to the baby, which can kill it. This is a whole other kettle of fish and normally doesn't happen, but high humidity at this point to keep the membrane wet is important.
Keep us posted. I'll watch for your posts.