Maybe someone can lend some insight to this. My chicks are pipping but they wont zip on out. My temps hold pretty consistant and my humidity seems ok, so why wont they come out. They just lay there and chirp, it is so frustrating because I can see their little beaks, can see them moving, hear them, but wont come out. Dont know what to do, please help.
I wouldn't panic yet. When did they start to pip? It takes a long time for them to come out, and some are faster than others. It is very tiring work for them..... I know it is hard, but try and be patient. I had 1 last year took 24 hours from pip to zip and he was fine Hang in there!
i know how it feels....been there....done that........kill some time away from the bator that way it won't feel that looooooooooong
They pip, stay that way for hours , then die. Chirp, move, ect. just wont come on out. Temp stays right around 100, humidity right at 70 to 75. Cant figure it out.
For them to make it so far in incubation and then fail to emerge from the shell is very frustrating. Could you tell us a little about the eggs? Are they shipped or from your own flock? If your eggs are from your own flock, you might want to look into a nutritional imbalance of some kind. Could it be that there is too much calcium in your hens' diet? I've read about people feeding crushed eggshells mixed with tempting things like applesauce as a way to encourage their hens to take in more calcium. I don't think that's always the best idea, especially if you feed a balanced feed ration. Too much of a good thing, as they say. The slightest difference in eggshell thickness could be just enough to challenge a tired chick to the point where it cannot fully hatch.
It sounds like you have everything correct, the humidity seems high to me, but that is my personal preference to keep it around 60% when in lock down so I don't have chicks that are too wet or drown. I also dry incubate too. The only other thing I could think of is that they did not lose enough fluid weight BEFORE lock down and you are having some drowning issues. If you opened the eggs, do they look really fluidy inside?
Still alive as of now. I should have been clearer. This is what happened last hatch, but seems to be happening again. Also, these are my eggs not shipped. Oh, buy the way, they are silkies.
How long have they been pipped? My chicks usually take between 20-30 hours to go from tiny chip in shell to hatching out. If it's been 30 hours, I'll sometimes help them out.
x2... let us know how long they have been pipped... it takes a while for them to take in all that yolk and for all the membranes to dry up..
