quail calamity

[susie66]

Thanks marigold. a quite reassuring reply. However a disaster has unfolded meantime, and half of it is my fault. I came down this morning to find pippin at the furthest end of the lodge having absolutely no interest in her nest. Having felt the eggs, they were very cold so i knew she hadnt been on them in quite some time. I took the four eggs and turned on the lamp i used for the previous eggs, in the hope of keeping them warm and hopefully surviving. I noticed one egg was rather cracked on one side and picked a little at the shell. there was no baby inside however, just a gooey mess, covering about a fifth of the shell. disheartened i did the same on the second shell and again there was no baby. i did the same on the third and fourth and some more goo came out, on the last one a spot of blood also came out. Having thought all the shells were empty i wanted out of curiosity and for experience sake to fully check the last two eggs also when to my horror, as i was checking the third egg there was a baby in it. it was still breathing. But obviously i`d now opened the protective membrane, and though i tried to do my best to keep the air from getting in I had to dispose of a wee, dead chick. Id say it just needed another couple of days before it was due. So now i have one last little egg under the lamp with a very small opening and prob dead chick inside. Hopefully I`ll have learned a lot from your forum by the time my next chicks arrive. I have a couple of photos I`m going to try to download. I`m hopelessly bad at technology though, so we`ll see. Thanks again for all your advice. Susie

 

[Marigold]

I'm so sorry, Susie, what a nasty experience for you. Don't beat yourself up about it, though. You were quite right to try the autopsy, and if the eggs were cold anyway, even the developing chick or chicks wouldn't have had much chance. I'm afraid there won't be much hope for the one left, if the shell is cracked and hatching hasn't yet started, as not only constant, correct temperature but high humidity is essential at that late stage, and a lamp wouldn't provide this. Even if it did hatch, you would find problems rearing a single chick, socially as well as physically, as they need companions of their own age, and it would be near-impossible to introduce a single youngster to the other adults once it was a few weeks old. It's quite common for those hens who do start to brood a clutch, to go off their eggs before they hatch, so not unexpected I'm afraid. Quail eggs are very easy to hatch in an incubator, with a bit of know how, so maybe next time you could borrow one to have another go. Anyway, do please let us know how you get on. Quail are incredibly tough little birds, I have heard of eggs hatching after being in a fridge for several days, so you never know, (though these hadn't started to develop.)
If you do try letting her sit on eggs again, it might be better to make her a little secluded, dark and private area, either in a separate cage or in a fenced- off part of the run, so she isn't disturbed by the other birds. And of course, maybe see if it would be possible to have an incubator running on standby, to transfer any eggs if she did change her mind part way through.