Silkies: removing early hatchers during lockdown?

[The Otters]

Hello everybody,

As this is our first post, we wished to start off by thanking you, as we've learnt so much already from this community. Now in our 4th generation of raising silkies, we are happy to help in turn, if we can!

Today we face a dilemma. In an incubator programmed as a hatcher (Borotto Lumia 16), we have 12 eggs at 37.7C & 65% humidity. We went into lockdown on day 17, it is now day 19 and we have 3 fluffy chicks peeping & rolling their sibling eggs around, 1 egg which pipped 24 hours ago, and the remaining eggs (candled and confirmed just before lockdown) still unhatched.

We've read that silkies can take up to 48 hours after pipping to complete their hatch, so if we open the incubator now we risk compromising the pipped egg. On the other hand, silkies being smaller than other chicks, allowing more than 24 hours to pass seems risky. Some sites mention taking them out after 24 hours. Others say 48, 72, and so forth (albeit without referencing silkies particularly).

You can see where we're going with this... can and should we take these three fluffies out as soon as possible before other eggs pip? It seems that silkies can go on hatching, with an extended window, up to day 24!

This is the first time we're short of a silkie hen, for very sad reasons indeed which we intend to share in due course and to which many of you will surely relate, but, meanwhile, any tips on our prospects would be very much appreciated.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Thanks again and kindest regards to all

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Chicks can last about 3 days without eating. I just take mine out as soon as they're dry. 5 seconds wont automatically kill pipped eggs

 

[MadamContrary]

Pull them out and either spritz a bit of warm water on one wall (just not the eggs directly) or place a paper towel that's been moistened into the incubator in order to quickly boost the humidity but not in a long-term manner.

 

[The Otters]

Chicks can last about 3 days without eating. I just take mine out as soon as they're dry. 5 seconds wont automatically kill pipped eggs

Thank you for this super fast reply! So this 3 day rule applies also to silkies, then. They are so incredibly small!

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Thank you for this super fast reply! So this 3 day rule applies also to silkies, then. They are so incredibly small!

Yep, all chicks, including bantams

 

[The Otters]

Pull them out and either spritz a bit of warm water on one wall (just not the eggs directly) or place a paper towel that's been moistened into the incubator in order to quickly boost the humidity but not in a long-term manner.

Thank you, nice tip. With the incubator I mentioned there is a humidity device which automatically adds water into the channels. It is interesting to watch it work. We added distilled water to a bottle and it takes it from there and injects into channels under the hatching grid. Hopefully it will resore the levels asap when we take them out tomorrow (i.e. 48 hours after 1st one hatched).

 

[The Otters]

Yep, all chicks, including bantams

If this is not magic, egg to chicken, I don't know what is ! Thanks for the support, much appreciated.