Shrink wrapped duckling?? First time hatching ducks, need help!

[SilkiesForEver]

I have a very old incubator ("Little Giant Still-Air Incubator) with none of the new conveniences. Except for auto turning.
I have three little "trays" for water, but I have no idea what the humidity is!! This is my first time hatching ducklings, and all of the half hatched ducklings appear to be shrink wrapped!
Should I hatch them out? I've done this many, many times due to my darned 'bator, so I'm getting pretty good at it. Is there anything I should know? Should I wait?

 

[mominoz]

First , you might ask this in the Duck forum...because there are more professional duckies there.

Now . you need a gadget to tell humidity. I like the Accurite thermometer/ with a humidity reader. I's about 6-10 $ Often a hardware type store or garden center or Amazon where I got mine. I have only hatched last year so I am no expert. But I read"Storeys Guide to Ducks", where Dave Holderread has a nice section on incubating ducks. But you need to know humidity. Around 45-55 % I believe from memory during incubation, but needs to go up the last couple days during hatch as much as 75% in a Still Air incubator. Also , you need to "lockdown" and not open it or turn during the last 3 days. (I opened mine too much and had some shrinkers too.) What you can do is wrap the egg in a wet paper towel, if the membrane is too tough and drying out.) You can also spray the eggs with warm water. I actually cut the membrane and used tweezers to nip away on membrane to save some of my Hookbills who stayed in the egg too long (My incubation temp. was too low as I measured it wrong --also had 3 power outages).
You can search, how to incubate Duck eggs also in the bar above.

 

[SilkiesForEver]

First , you might ask this in the Duck forum...because there are more professional duckies there.

Now . you need a gadget to tell humidity. I like the Accurite thermometer/ with a humidity reader. I's about 6-10 $ Often a hardware type store or garden center or Amazon where I got mine. I have only hatched last year so I am no expert. But I read"Storeys Guide to Ducks", where Dave Holderread has a nice section on incubating ducks. But you need to know humidity. Around 45-55 % I believe from memory during incubation, but needs to go up the last couple days during hatch as much as 75% in a Still Air incubator. Also , you need to "lockdown" and not open it or turn during the last 3 days. (I opened mine too much and had some shrinkers too.) What you can do is wrap the egg in a wet paper towel, if the membrane is too tough and drying out.) You can also spray the eggs with warm water. I actually cut the membrane and used tweezers to nip away on membrane to save some of my Hookbills who stayed in the egg too long (My incubation temp. was too low as I measured it wrong --also had 3 power outages).
You can search, how to incubate Duck eggs also in the bar above.

Thank you so much. I have added a wet paper towel to the incubator (in a little bowl), and I'm hoping that will boost the humidity. The membrane is really tough and sticky, clinging to the ducklings body. I have read the article, and that helped a ton and I will try to see if I can get a hydrometer asap. Thanks again!