so frustrating to watch them struggle.....

[ladybug99]

I am on day 23 of my hatch. One baby hatched on Sunday morning quick and easy.... one piped on Sunday as well and she was pecking at the shell.. that egg now has a dark dry hole...no peeping or signs of life to it.

No one hatched out on Sunday although I had one that did not pip but cracked wide enough where the hatched chick was pecking at the baby fuzz of the chick inside....that egg does rock once and a while...but no peeping

This morning I woke up to three pipped eggs.. that was at 7am... it is now 6:30pm and these three are still fighting. One of the eggs has enough removed where I can see the chicks eye and I am watching him breath very heavily.. he is peeping in response to the baby I have in the brooder.. his egg is moving all over the place... but he has been trying to get out since this morning

The second egg I can see the beak bobbing in and out but the membrane looked very dry, so I opened up the incubator and with a warm wet q tip I moistened the membrane....that seemed to help and chick has removed a large part of the egg shell but all I can see is his beak and a white membrane. My humidity was at 65 all day long and pretty much that all during lock down.. when I opened up the incubator I replenished the water and re wet the sponge. and the humity went up to 70. The humidity has gone down as low as 55 and that was when I took the live chick out last night. But it went up to 65 in literally two minutes of me closing the incubator. This egg is also peeping and moving around

now my last egg is just a little pip and again the membrane looked dry with a very tiny hole in it and with a little tap of warm water that chick pepped right up and that egg is peeping and rocking as well.

I feel I have done very well and I only opened the incubator only twice during the entire lock down process but am concerned the membrane was so white that my humidity has been off for the whole hatch

Will any of theses babies survive.. and at what point should I help them out??

 

[Maggizzle35]

Hi there:
I'm not sure what type of chicks you are hatching or what type of incubator you have. I have to manually turn my eggs at least 3 times a day. If you have an incubator that automatically does that for you everything should be good. I also have to add water to the little wells as I have 3 of the mini Eco Brinsea incubators.

Yesterday and this morning, I helped 2 of mine. The hatch date was 4/16 and I heard the one chirping yesterday and today and poked thru the shell and only opened the top where the birds beak was coming through. Yesterday I did this with one of the Polish chick eggs, I could see it moving but no noise. I did have to peel some of the shell and lining away this morning but there are times when they do need help. When I know there is life in there and it doesn't seem to arrive like it's suppose to, I do give a helping hand by poking through the big air bubble side. If the humidity isn't just right some times that lining gets too thick for them to break thru. It can take quite a while for an egg to pip but if I leave in the morning at 7:30 am and it's still not out by the time I get ready for bed that night, I do give it a helping hand.
I hope this helps a little. I have several coming still and had 7 happy little hatchers this weekend.
Margaret The color of those eggs is incredible

 

[ladybug99]

I am hatching my own Welsummer eggs.. we set 29 and have had only one hatch so far. Not to sure of thier fertility as we have one Rooster to eleven hens...they are so dark that as a first time candeler like I had difficult time looking inside them we have had seven that showed signs of life so far. I have a little Giant styrofoam incubator...my temps have been constant 99.5 the whole time and the humidity never dropped under 65 %

I think the one the furthest along might make it out tonight.. I would hate to lose them after actually seeing them move and struggle for so long

 

[koakritters]

i had to help one of mine last hatch that only managed a tiny hole. it ended up being too big for it's egg!!! couldn't move itself around to get out. I took it in the bathroom with the shower on for humidity and very carefully using a tweezers started removing the egg like they would have done themselves. if you do this try to leave the membrane on and keep it moist with a damp rag while helping. mine was so weak i had to get her all the way out. she laid there for a couple hours after, didn't even open her eyes. but she finally got up and she's a very happy sweet little 9 day old girl now.

Good luck! I think that it's always better to help if there's a chance that the chick will die. They might die if you help, but if they are stuck in that egg than they will die if you leave them alone. Just my opinion, i'm sure everyone has their own ideas about this.

 

[ladybug99]

HOw long can these guys go on like this????

 

[Tuffoldhen]

Patience! Chicks can take 24 hours or longer from pipping an egg til they zip out. There are reasons it takes some that long. Absorbing the yolk sac, breathing and resting in between. It's hard work getting out of an egg.

 

[ladybug99]

these little guys have only been struggling for15 hours.. poor little guys... I can see new eggs rocking and rolling now.....I do appreciate the advice

 

[Maggizzle35]

It's really hard to tell sometimes. If you are only on day 23 I would give it a little more time because I've read that depending on collection date and fertility date the days may vary somewhat. I can usually hear mine chirping from within. If that goes on more than a day and I'm not seeing them appear, then I help. Did you have to turn the eggs manually? I had one of 8 eggs hatch because the rest were not fertile and that was my second attempt at incubating. I'm glad that one was fertile because it gave me a beautiful rooster, and I have since lost it's dad so I have one to carry on.

I'm not familiar with the styro incubators so I'm not much help in that area. I have 3 small incubators from Brinsea and that's all I've used and it has worked well. I did concocked my own out of a cake carrier, light bulb kit, a glass jar with water in it and a little thermometer to get some eggs started but I don't know if it would have been successful to hatch them. I moved the active eggs to the incubator after i saw life.

Good luck I hope you get many more.
Margaret

 

[ladybug99]

I have an egg turner that worked the entire time. We collected the eggs three days prior to putting them in the incubator...... these are from our own flock.. not sure on how fertile they are we weren't expecting a big percentage to hatch....just hoping the ones that start hatching actually finish