pipped and then died. yolk leeking out? what happened?

[KattyKillFish]

i've got some silver phoenix eggs here that all seem to be doing great so far. a few of them decided to pip early (hatch day is on the 7th). one of them, the last one to start pipping, was doing great zipping along screaming past the others, he was really eager to get out of that egg. i went to work on the boat figuring that by the time i got home he'd be out.

when i called my boyfriend (it's his day off) i asked him how they were doing. he said the first two were busy, taking rests between zipping, but the other one had yolk leeking out of the egg and wasn't moving anymore, no chirps or anything. just still. he said he was obviously dead. he hadn't mover or chirped for hours, and he was for the most part out of his egg. he said it looked like it had drowned in it's yolk.

i told him to take the egg out and put it in a shopping bag in the basement. when i came home i took a look at it. i thought it would be alot mroe messy but there was actually very little yolk. i opened the egg up and the poor little thing had some poo on it's butt? is this how it died?

not sure what happened, but do you think it had anything to do with the early hatching? or the eagerness to get out of the egg?

these were shipped eggs, there was a power outage on day 12 and the temp went down to 96-97 for less than an hour. after that i put the temp up to 101.3 for a few days and then back down to 100.6 like i usually like to keep it at.

was a wrong to do that? any ideas on why he died?

 

[selinagil]

I don't realy know--that seems awful wierd. Maybe it was some sorta internal problem and he just happened to poop before he died. It sounds like he absorbed the yolk but maybe it didn't absorb correctly. I don't know but I'm sorry you lost the chick and maybe someone else will know more.

 

[KattyKillFish]

thank you for your sympathy

my mom is taking it alot worse than i am. poor woman cried the whole drive home

i had to tell her that if it did hatch it likely wouldn't have been a healthy baby. i just wonder why it sipped so energetically. i figured "this ones a tough one for sure!" but i guess not. Nick said it looked like it had drowned in its goo, but when i took a look at it, it didn't have a lot of goo around it's face.

either way, i hope the others will be okay. they seem to want to go at a more natural pace. do you think that since they are not in a hurry, they have a better chance? why did he want to come out so bad?

 

[aberfitch]

you have said nothing about your humidity. what was it at?

 

[KattyKillFish]

oh! i forgot.

humidity was at a steady 45-50% during incubation and a steady 70-80% since late night on day 17.

 

[PECULIARPETE]

Sounds like a development issue to me? Maybe they got a chill during incubation and warmed back up to fast during the power outage? I`ve read that they can handle being out from under a live hen for up to 30 minutes while she feeds n stuff. Or when candleing. In my last hatch I had one make it all the way out with some yolk that hadn`t been drawn in and his navel was still hangin out. It started to dry up but quite a bit stayed attached. Well being the father of 7 human kidz (although I used to question how human they were sometimes?) and being there to cut the cord I figured if I soaked some cotton string from a feed bag and tied off the navel in question my little peep mite make it? She did for almost a week, but it just wasn`t ment to be I guess? Don`t fret about it its natures way. I just candled a new setting last night in my revamped homemade bator and its all good so far. Whoo Hoo. We`ll see in 17 days. I`ll be elated if I can do better than 70% now that I`ve worked out some of the kinks I hope. It`s a blast doing this! Good luck with the rest of your peeps

 

[KattyKillFish]

thanks. i've got 2 healthy babies now! they seem to be doing pretty good. still drying off in the incubator though, i checked them about noon today and they looked like they had just popped out.

i'm glad it was just the one so fat that was having problems. i gotta few more questions... can a chick decide to come out of the egg later than it should have, or will it die inside the egg if it doesn't hatch in time?

and is 80% humidity too high? it's good and steady at 75% which is where it is the last time.

the good news is that i have 25 chicks coming in the mail next week, and on monday i have more eggs coming from the same fellow i got these from. he did a great job packaging them and i had absolutely NO early embryo deaths from these. the chicks that hatched out are very active and happy so far, too

what i always try to tell myself is that if i didn't survive it wasn't meant to. it likely had some internal problems because after i pulled the chick out to look at it, everything looked normal aside from the poo on it's bum. i thought that was rather odd.

i have another pip, too! i hope this one's as healthy as the ones that hatched!

 

[selinagil]

Hey--I'm no expert in hatching but every chick I've hatched has been late so I guess they could die in the egg after being in there too long, but I also know that they can be late and still be ok too. My first chick I ever hatched was 4 days late pipping and it took him 24 hours to completely finish so he actually hatched 5 days late. Maybe some serial hatchers will chime in. Post some pics of the fluffy butts!!!!

 

[KattyKillFish]

well for the sake of cuteness. here are the healthy ones. one is much fatter and darker than the other, but they both are pretty mellow. the smaller one is already starting to show signs of shyness while the bigger darker one is much bolder and talkative. they seem to like snuggling my face when i'm laying on the couch.

here is the big fat one

he is much heavier than the other and a lot less skittish.

 

[rizq]

They are WAY TOO CUTE!!!! I cannot wait for my chicks to hatch (and I have not even set the eggs yet

) My bator has not been working so it has been too long since I had a hatch ... new bator arrives today