wrongly set incubator

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chickenfan

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I am on day 19 of incubating 20 eggs and have found to my dismay that the incubator has had the humidity set too high for the first 18.5 days (65% instead of 45% humidity). I have now reduced the humidity to 30% but am not sure what to best do for the last two days in order to give the chicks some small chance of hatching?

If the chicks are too big to hatch, what is the most humane thing to do?
 
Are these chicken eggs Chickenfan? If so the humidity needs to go up and the temp down slightly and stop turning. If you lower the humidity now any chicks that hatch will stick to the dry membrane and die. If the air sac hasn't formed the chicks will not have enough room to manoeuvre to pip. There is nothing you can do about that now, they will just run out of energy and die in the shells. You will have to wait and see what happens I'm afraid.
 
Hi Chris, yes chicken eggs. They are due to hatch tomorrow eve (21 days). I didn't know about the temperature going down. What would you set this at? Is it worth keeping normal humidity of 45% today and just raising it to 65% tomorrow? Or are they likely to try and pip early?

I can see the air sack.
 
No Chickenfan, the humidity must go up immediately. If you can see an air sac and they are cheeping there is nothing wrong. They have to uncoiled their heads to be able to cheep and pip so you could be having a successful hatch. Temperature drops half a degree to compensate for the heat they are generating now they are moving- down to 37.0 if I remember correctly.
 
Thanks very much for sharing all your knowledge and experience Chris. Much appreciated.
 
Hi Icemaiden,

Thank you for asking. Its end of day 22 and I've had 10 of my 20 eggs hatch, (Plymouth Rock, Pekin, Sablepoot, Marans) so am feeling much more fortunate than I should be after my horrible error. No Araucana have hatched, so perhaps lower humidity is more critical for them.
 
Mixed breeds in the same incubator can have mixed results anyway Chickenfan. It is down to the porosity of the egg shells.
 
That's interesting - so you should have all one breed together? If I had just Araucana in there do you think they might have hatched? How does the porosity work?
 
The thicker shells I assume lose less moisture. So the Araucana should have the thickest shells and the others were thin enough to lose egg water content and develop an acceptable air sac, even with such high humidity. I don't know what happens if the humidity is too low and the air sac is too big -presumably the chick dehydrates and dies? With your settings, if you had all Araucana none would have hatched.
 
Chris, I switched off the incubator last night (3 days over) picked up the eggs, and one cheeped - so back in the incubator and the Pekin has now hatched at 4 days overdue (25 days) and I have a Vorwerk pipped. Isn't that amazing! These are eggs my broody was sitting on, but I noticed she was letting some get cold.
 
Eggs getting cold, like a power failure or poorly insulated incubator, doesn't necessarily mean they will die Chickenfan. They can just hatch late. But 4 days over is the latest I've ever heard of. You are certainly having a lot of luck with this hatch -just hope they aren't all cockerels!
 
We are 3 hours into day 5 and the Vorwerk has hatched. I am a little worried about this one. It has a little bit of blood on its tummy button and is rolling around a lot, finding it hard to get on its feet.
 
Chick looks OK now - bleeding stopped and sitting. I just hope in the time it was bleeding a little (the egg skin was very sticky) it won't have picked up an infection from the incubator. Would you put these last two with the other chicks (now running around) or rear them under an electric hen because they are much younger?
 
You need to integrate them as soon as possible Chickenfan, to avoid later problems when they have formed into a flock which they will have done at 2 weeks. Presumably they are now moving about properly. Hopefully the Vorwerk will be OK but keep a very close eye on them for the first few hours.
 
Thank you Chris. Little Pekin is in with the others. The Vorwerk may have something wrong. Since birth its had a very quiet cheep. It was active at birth and got to sitting position, then stayed still and slept all night without all the struggling around that normally goes on. Its sitting, but not standing, and is still resting. I'll wait and see with this one. Maybe 26 days was too long to be in the egg.
 
You may find that the yolk has not yet been fully absorbed Chickenfan. So it has no desire to move around much. But there is a possibility that you are quite right and the poor little thing has no future.

Which type of incubator do you have? We use semi-automatic units, the latest of which is a Covatuttu24. There is no humidity meter on it, you just make a judgement and decided whether to fill one tray with water or not. In the UK probably not, over here you definitely would. Then two trays for hatching. But we hatch with a Suro20 taken out of the auto-turning cradle (because it has broken) and wrapped around the sides with bubble wrap. The humidity pump still works amazingly.
 
As always, you are a mine of information, Chris, and I'm very grateful. So if the yolk sack was not fully absorbed this will be why the chick was still. I have actually now put it under Mum with the other 7 chicks, so it will not be very stationery. Is it better to keep it in the brooder for 24 hours?

The incubator is R-com 20 and I cannot fault it. After all, it hatched so many chicks when I had the settings wrong. The two late-hatches were ones my broody hen was not incubating well, which I added to the incubator when the chicks started to hatch. I shan't use her again for sitting as she has always had a very low hatch rate - I think because she always lets some get cold at the edges. She is, however, a wonderful mother. It is lovely to see them.
 
I would keep her in the brooder until fully mobile and slip her under the mother at night Chickenfan. Otherwise she may be crushed.
 
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