He is ENORMOUS. I have no idea how he fit into that tiny egg - he had a tiny air sac too, and he certainly filled up all the remaining space! I suspect that was the problem, he was just too big to maneuver a full zip, only the two pips.
I am happy to report that baby turkey is now on his feet looking fluffy and perfect.
Please don't judge me, but I did assist. Since it's my first egg of my first hatch I know people are going to automatically think I jumped the gun... and maybe I did, mother of three via Cesarian section that I am, but I did give him 30+ hours to complete the hatch on his own. Poor little thing pipped and then nothing for well over a day... I could hear him peeping... I have read everything this site offers on assisting, so I felt like I knew what to do, but I was terrified the entire time. I went slowly and applied bacitracin on exposed membrane. The inner membrane looked dark brown and the vessels were shriveled and mostly brown, so I felt it was safe to proceed. The membrane didn't feel tough/leathery, so I don't think the membrane was holding him back. I think it was space. I exposed about a third of baby, and set him back for the last time. Minutes later he gave a final shove and was out. There was poop in his shell, so I think he was definitely ready to be out! I shouldn't say "he"; my 5-year-old has named baby "Rose Chocolate Familia Mountain, Rose for short".
2nd egg is beginning to wiggle again. I am not surprised it's 3 days behind the other - on candling it looked well behind the other.
and those are the ones I REALLY wanted. Our of my 15 bantam cochin eggs I have 13 kicking and growing and out of my 5 EE eggs I have 2 that are great and 1 that I can't see into because the egg is too pourse, but the air sack is growing so I'm holding on to it. Hubby says I'm done with eggs for the year because he doesn't want the chicks to have a hard time hardening off for winter and doesn't want then in the house until March because we already have a BLRW with a hurt leg and 2 house Seramas. Blah!
The breeder hatched mine for me since he had room in his incubator. So nice of him. 7 of 8 hatched. I have all females maybe 2 males at most. He said most of his breeds hatch 75-90% females. He has no idea why. I happy with my hatch. The are awfully cute.
I tried to hatch in a carton twice. Mostly my chicks got stuck. Even when they got out of their own egg they fell into another. One dried into another egg. I had to soak him to get him out. It was cute all of those chicks half out of the eggs.
