Valentines Day Hatch-A-Long 2016

[FridayYet]

I'd get it out of there fast! Healthy eggs don't have brown bubbly liquid.

I have one pip and another with a brown bubbly liquid on it, the incubator doesn't smell so I don't think I should remove it?

 

[RonoKT]

I was reluctant to open the incubator, I think I have done too much of that in previous hatches. I took your advice though and when I smelled the egg on its own it did smell. Thanks.
I candles the egg and there was a dark mass and a good airsacs, just what I would want at day 20? Is there anyway I could of seen this earlier? I have saved the egg but I'm reluctant to open it for the smell.

 

[RonoKT]

I'd get it out of there fast! Healthy eggs don't have brown bubbly liquid.

Sorry still not got the hang of quoting on mobile.

 

[RonoKT]

Thinking about it, I have thought the incubator smelled less than fresh for a while, I thought it was just smelling warm and wet but now it smells allot better, I need to remember that if it smells at all, there is a problem.

 

[NTBugtraq]

I was reluctant to open the incubator, I think I have done too much of that in previous hatches. I took your advice though and when I smelled the egg on its own it did smell. Thanks.
I candles the egg and there was a dark mass and a good airsacs, just what I would want at day 20? Is there anyway I could of seen this earlier? I have saved the egg but I'm reluctant to open it for the smell.

Firstly, I have had an egg hatch in the garbage...so just because you removed it doesn't mean it may not finish on its own. That said, leaving it in the bator with a "brown bubbly liquid" just sounds like it was getting ready to explode.

As far as "seen this earlier", there are so many variables. The color and thickness of the shell, the breed (e.g. its hatching color), the freshness of the batteries in your candler, the darkness of the room when candling, all of these can affect your ability to detect a late death. They don't create red rings, and if you can see movement you really can't tell them apart from the live chicks. Seeing movement can be very dependent on when you candle...chicks are frequently resting towards the end as each step they have to do can really exhaust them.

So, in the end, just put it down to "a failure to thrive" and accept it as fate for that chick. It may very well have needed the completely opposite environment than the rest of your eggs. For example, a really porous egg needs a much higher humidity than average eggs or it will lose way too much weight...well, you can hardly do that, now can you...

Believe it or not, a 50% hatch rate is a GOOD hatch rate. Above that is GREAT, and for some breeds even less than 50% can be good. For the 700 eggs I have placed in an incubator, my hatch rates have been 53.66%, 35.29%, 51.35%, 48.15%, 70.97%, 60.00%, 39.39%, 80.00%, 56.67%, 75.76%, and 77.27%. Notice they are all over the place, and not consistently rising as I might hope based on experience. There are just so many factors that are out of our control.

 

[TJordan]

I have one pip and another with a brown bubbly liquid on it, the incubator doesn't smell so I don't think I should remove it?

GET IT OUT!!!!

 

[RonoKT]

It's out! I knew that it wasn't a good sign but u didn't want to open the incubator unnecessarily. I'm hatching posted eggs, so I'm not expecting great hatch rates and just trying to learn as much as I can from each hatch, so far from a total of 30 eggs I have hatched 12 and one has died.

 

[RonoKT]

To clarify I am not yet counting this hatch, that is all previous.

 

[4stakes]

Will a one day old chick learn to eat by its self? We only had one hatch and has not eaten yet. Took the chick out of incubator at 1 pm. Also how long do we give the other eggs to hatch? I don't see any pips. First one hatched Saturday morning. Should I wait til Tuesday on end it tomorrow? I put the eggs in the incubator on January 22 at 7:30 pm.

Thanks, Kevin

 

[junebuggena]

Will a one day old chick learn to eat by its self? We only had one hatch and has not eaten yet. Took the chick out of incubator at 1 pm. Also how long do we give the other eggs to hatch? I don't see any pips. First one hatched Saturday morning. Should I wait til Tuesday on end it tomorrow? I put the eggs in the incubator on January 22 at 7:30 pm.

Thanks, Kevin

They don't need to eat for about 72 hours after hatching. You do need to show them how/where to drink though. You just dip their beak in the water. They get the hang of drinking fairly quickly. Chicks are incredibly curious, and they usually find the food on their own.