Wacky Incubation! What was the cause?

[Bbrent]

Help me solve this one - I'm stumped!! I ordered 6 silkie eggs to incubate. They were out when ordered, so they just sent them when they were back in stock... Of course, they arrived one day before I had to be out of town (ugh!). I set incubator up a day prior to be sure all was well, set eggs in when they arrived and the next day left town (praying!). Wouldn't you know... A HUGE storm came through and knocked down power lines for 14 hours. Candled at day 7 and only one questionable egg. Wahoo! That was close! Then, the worst happened again ... Another freaking storm! You guessed it, power out again. This time for only six hours and I put a heavy quilt on them. Candled again and discarded one milky egg after. Day 18, all 5 silkie sweeties look awesome. Look down and 3 hatch perfectly on day 22. A miracle! (And they're the cutest things I've ever seen.) But wait... The 2 others, nothing... I let them incubate till day 26. We carefully opened them tonight and my heart sank. Fully developed. One super dry. One super moist. But whyyyyy! What do you all think happened to these last two?! I realize they've been though a bunch, but three hatched beautifully and why are the last two such different cases? Thx in advance for advice!

 

[EggSighted4Life]

Hi, welcome to BYC!

Sometimes those things just happen.

3/6 hatching from shipped eggs is pretty awesome!

Did you happen to move your eggs around to a new spot each day? I do this because even in my forced air incubator there are temp differences throughout.

I will try to come back later today with hatch diagnosis links.

 

[Bbrent]

Thanks so kindly for your reassuring words! And glad to hear my hatch rate was a positive.

It was just so hard to open those eggs and see developed chicks within... I wish I could have known how to help them!

You idea about moving the eggs around is a good one - because one egg was so dry and one was so wet. Planning on hatching heritage turkeys at some point. So I will be sure to move the eggs to different positions in the incubator.

Thx again!!



QUOTE="EggSighted4Life, post: 19672468, member: 415725"]Hi, welcome to BYC!

Sometimes those things just happen.

3/6 hatching from shipped eggs is pretty awesome!

Did you happen to move your eggs around to a new spot each day? I do this because even in my forced air incubator there are temp differences throughout.

I will try to come back later today with hatch diagnosis links.[/QUOTE]

 

[Bbrent]

My peeps!

 

[Harmony Fowl]

I agree that rotation is a very good idea. I had one hatch with enormous chicks hatching out on day 19 and tiny ones hatching out day 23. Obviously something was up. Some eggs got way more heat than needed, others got barely enough and many not enough to hatch. I rotate by row whenever I turn since then.