Chicks are not hatching, seem to be drowning in the egg.

[PhilippinesChicGirl]

I have performed an eggtopsy on the unhatched eggs and some eggs are fully grown but surrounded with fluid. I am using a homemade incubator with just lights and thermostat.

 

[Debbie292d]

Do you have a thermometer/hygrometer in there? The latter tells the humidity.

This sounds like they had too high of humidity.

From set day to lockdown, it should be around 40-50%, then up to 65-70% at lockdown (3 days before hatch day).

 

[PhilippinesChicGirl]

Yes, we have a electronic thermostat that also monitors humidity. We have a small humidifier in the incubator and it is reading 65 to 70 at lockdown. The chics start to pip at 19 days and they run out of energy and stop breaking the shell. We have had to help all of them so far. I am thinking the shells might be too hard. The ones that have drowned never started to pip at all. We opened each egg after 24 days and so far we have found 3 that were fully developed but dead. There was fluid inside the shell. We have changed the rooster because only about 40% of the eggs have been fertile. It's very frustrating to incubate and get poor results. Thank you for your assistance.

 

[Debbie292d]

Glad you are trying a different rooster as 40% is pretty sad.

Chicks can take up to 24 hours once they've pipped to finally hatch so I don't know how long you waited. They take a lot of breaks and rest. Sometimes mine hatch in an hour, sometimes overnight. Never 24 hours, but that's what they can take and still be fine. Mine are silkies and their shells are like porcelain so I know they can be tougher to get out but they make it!

Assisting chicks hatch often winds up causing problems with the chicks' legs and/or neck. If yours are okay, whew! I only had to help one once that pipped on the wrong end, and it came out okay, but so many I hear have issues.

It sounds like everything else was okay in your incubator so why some seemingly were drowned is a mystery as that can only come from the environment they're in.