Rough Night

[jesnbec]

Had a rough night last night with a couple of chicks, might need some BYC wisdom... We have three sets of eggs, two incubators so it's complicated but I'll try to simplify. First set of eggs we got from a friend, they were utterly filthy, worst dirty eggs we've ever seen and we probably should have just ditched them but we washed them off and incubated them anyway. Life finds a way sometimes and we did get what we thought were six good eggs, two of them hatched no problem and they are buzzing around the brooder as we speak.

Two of them had a really hard time and I ended up having to do an assist, one of those two is doing OK, not great, and the other seems to be struggling a little. Those two, every time I try to move them into the brooder, they crash and burn. One of them, the one that is struggling, literally went belly up last night in the brooder and I had to rescue it with some apple juice. It perked up after the juice and being moved back into the incubator, but they both seem to not want to do well when I try to move them to the brooder. Brooder is fine, the other chicks are a-hopping and bopping, I'd hate to cull any of them, they pop to their feet and chirp when I open the incubator but just seem kind of weak.

There are two more eggs in there that haven't pipped and we're on Day 22. I candled those two and you can't see anything but darkness, can no longer make out an air sack or anything, just solid dark. What, if anything, should I do with the two eggs that haven't pipped, and how can I get these weaker chicks out of the incubator without them just crashing again?

Candling the eggs is useless, they just show a black mass in the eggs and the chicks do okay as long as they stay in the incubator but don't do well at all when I try to transfer them. It's well into day 22 on the mystery eggs but they are heavy and light can't seem to penetrate anything at this point.

The other two sets of eggs are due to go into our lockdown incubator on 4/17 and 4/20, a week on one batch, and a week and three days on the next batch. Those eggs were great, clean, fertile and showing movement in all of them so far. Question with that is... Is a week apart too far apart in ages to safely share a brooder, and if not, what methods have any of you found successful to separate bitties in a single brooder as we only have one larger brooder? If needed we could set up another but would rather keep it to one if possible. Anyways, thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[Ridgerunner]

Is a week apart too far apart in ages to safely share a brooder, and if not, what methods have any of you found successful to separate bitties in a single brooder as we only have one larger brooder?

Some people have no problems if the chicks are two or three weeks apart in age. Some have problems even if they are the same age. I'd try it when I can observe and see what happens.

A mesh fence cutting the brooder into two separate parts can work, depending on the brooder and the fence. This is how I'd set it up for integration if just putting them in there did not work. Each side may need its own heat source if you are using a heat plate or heating pad. If you use a heat lamp put it at the border so it warms both sides.

 

[jesnbec]

Thanks! The one that was struggling tried to die on me twice last night, I was up to 5:30am with it giving it juice and honey water. I finally gave up and crashed, leaving it in the incubator. I woke up this morning completely expecting the worse and the little thing actually made it and is now hopping around with the rest of them. It's a beautiful silver colored chick, think it's a Rhode Island Blue?

The other two eggs that didn't hatch, I poked a hole in the air sack end and one of them was still chirping so I ended up doing a rescue hatch by removing the shell and keeping the membrane moist all day and all night tonight (not for the weak stomached to be sure)... but unbelievably that little guy, now on Day 23, finally got tired of laying around in a pulsating bag of goo and kicked his legs out finally at 3AM this morning. It has also pulled through and is now drying in the incubator as we speak and I am going to bed LOL

 

[jesnbec]

Next batch of eggs go into lockdown this thursday, I think I'm going to just let nature do it's thing, this rescue hatching with q-tips and tweezers has just completely wore me out, although to my credit, my efforts saved two of them that wouldn't have made it otherwise. I just could not for the life of me walk away from a chirping egg even though I knew it was probably doomed. Rescues can be done, but good lord the tedious process of breaking little pieces of shell, peeling back membranes millimeters at a time, rushing to stop bleeds in nano-level veins... it's as emotionally taxing as it is physically demanding. I had no idea how much goes into a rescue hatch, two of them has nearly killed me LOL

 

[LaFleche]

Next time you get soiled eggs, just bin them and the chance for healthy chicks hatching without problems will be much better.

For your next hatch clean and sanitize the incubator diligently so your next batch going into lockdown will not get contaminated with whatever the poopy eggs left behind.