Our First Shipped Eggs - Incubation Diary

[brownfoxfarm]

Video Update - Wednesday 2/20 (that would be day 16) I candled again and all the chicks were still moving in their eggs. I took a video of one... You can see the pencil marks where I've been tracking the growth of the air cell and noting visible movement. Watch the dark area in the upper left of the egg to see the baby move...

On Wednesday night we also began hearing the chick breathing and peeping in the most developed egg from the broody hens outside. For those who didn't see the story - we had 2 broody hens that other hens were laying eggs under, so after some eggs began to hatch there were still 2 living embryos who were not nearly ready, so we added them to the incubator to give them a chance. The most developed of the two pipped internally on Wednesday.

Thursday morning we woke to find that egg pipped and all the others still doing well. This would be day 17 for the original Silkie egg batch - of which we have 9 viable embryos out of the original 16 shipped eggs. Just before midnight the little added egg hatched and by this morning the chick was all dry and looking for some attention.

My daughter has named this baby Phoenix, and is imprinting it. The rest of the eggs received their last turn and are now in lock down.

We're looking at an ETA of Monday, February 24.

 

[ducksarecool12]

Looking forward to hear (see) good news! What kind and color is the baby that hatched? Partridge silkie?

 

[brownfoxfarm]

The chick in the above photo is a barnyard cross... Certainly part Silkie, but a little Ameraucana & who knows what else in there.

We are hearing some faint peeping from at least one egg in the incubator, but no movement and no external pips yet. (this as of 8AM on day 20).

 

[brownfoxfarm]

Tremendous disappointment. I candled the eggs last night, being concerned that I wasn't hearing much peeping or seeing any egg rocking. All but one of the chicks had died. Developed chicks but with yolks not absorbed and in 2 cases the embryos were distinctly malformed. The one egg that had been pipping internally was still cheeping, but had not made any progress toward breaking the shell after well over 12 hours. I assisted a bit and that one, lonely little chick is almost all the way out of the shell now (6:30 AM on day 21). It's a splash chick with a vaulted skull - so I'm hopeful it survives and turns out to be a pullet. Also - the second late egg we took from the nest of those hens who hatched Val on the 14th, it's internally pipped and making all kinds of noise.

I "egg-topsied" all the dead chicks & from what I could see, they simply stopped developing and died shortly after that last candling (on day 16). The unabsorbed yolk was roughly quarter sized, in some the yellow was deteriorating and runny, but in others it was a solid mass covered with blood-vessels. The chicks were covered in feathers, and seemed fine - with the exception of the deformed ones. I don't think humidity was the issue - the hatching chick was neither dried out, nor overly wet or surrounded by fluid. We did have trouble keeping the humidity steady, but I kept a close eye on the growth of the air cell & we were on track through out the incubation. The temperature was admirably stable for a Little Giant incubator.

I have photos of some of the deceased chicks, I'll likely add them to show the size of the yolks & maybe get a better idea of the "why" from more experienced folks here. For now, here is a photo of the soul survivor:



I have a couple of eggs from our silkies that I may go ahead and put in the incubator when this baby is up and at 'em. I'm just heartbroken right now.

 

[mjanderson437]

So so sorry for this outcome. I'm sure it must be rough.

 

[Caitlin_VT]

I'm sorry