To help chicks hatch or not? !

[LillyValley]

I have 6 eggs in the incubator at 8am this morning was 21 days. There are no pips. Should I do something to help them along or continue to wait?

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I'd wait. Have you candled?
In my experience, assisted hatch chicks don't often make it very long.
If you are breeding, you don't want to perpetuate genetics that can't hatch on their own.
It's entirely possible your temperature was a bit low which will add a day or two to incubation time.
Thermometers and thermostats are notoriously inaccurate.

 

[LillyValley]

I have not candled. Should i? I was thinking it is better to let them be at this stage. I just read some other posts that talk about the eggs moving. Non of mine have moved. ..

 

[ChickenCanoe]

You may start hearing them peeping in the egg.
I wouldn't candle now since hatching may be imminent and you don't want to affect the humidity in the incubator.
Candling will tell you if they even started to develop.
Have you raised the humidity?

Lots of good information in these links.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/hatching-eggs-and-raising-chicks

 

[LillyValley]

I candled on day 7 and they were growing. I have raised the humidity. I have the styrofoam incubator with a built in digital thermometer and humidity reading. The humidity reading is wrong. It says 40 but there is condensation on the windows. The temp reading is probably off too.so it may be another day like you suggested. fingers crossed we will have some action soon.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I struggled for ages with a variety of thermometers that all disagreed with one another. I kicked them all to the curb.
For next time, may I recommend the following 2 I use.
http://www.thermoworks.com/products/low_cost/rt301wa.html
https://www.brinsea.com/p-394-spot-check-digital-incubator-thermometer.aspx
Both are extremely accurate.
The thermoworks one will time out but will read at any temperature.
The spot check stays on but only reads in a narrow range. When outside that range it just displays a L or H for low or high. The downside of that is, without another thermometer, you don't know how high or how low.