Still Alive?

My last batch of japanese coturnix hatched over a week ago-- they already have feathers growing on their wings. Along with them in the incubator was a single bobwhite egg, which I turned/stop turning a few days later. The bobwhite was due to hatch nearly 5 days ago. At 25 days with no hatch, I unplugged the incubator, assuming that the chick was dead. Because I was too busy with school this week, I simply left the incubator sitting with the egg, waiting to clean it out later and put it all away... and, long behold, the egg has pipped, at Day 28! As soon as I noticed the little hole, I turned on the incubator again and set it to around 95 F (since the egg has been at around 70 F or less for two days, I didn't want to shock the egg). Is there any chance that this "procrastinator" egg will still hatch into a healthy chick? Was it right to turn on the incubator again? How long should I wait before declaring the chick dead if it stops pipping? I'm really confused as to why the egg is still hatching, when it has been without heat for so long.

Wow, that's amazing.

I've not had a Bobwhites hatch that late. 24 days is the longest incubation I've had for Bobwhites. I think you did the right thing switching the incubator back on.

I had a duckling hatch without heat. My incubator stopped working while I was away for the weekend, but the temperature outside was about 28-29C. He survived, but I had to help him because he was stuck to his shell. Despite having made a large hole, he just couldn't push himself out. I used some warm damp tissues to get him unstuck.

hi did your chick hatch and was it ok??

The chick still hasn't hatched, but the hole is *slowly* getting larger, so the chick is still alive. I don't want to help him, since I'm afraid of doing more harm than good, but being in that egg for much longer can't be very good for the little guy, either. Maybe he's stuck, like the duckling? I can't decide if I should try to help or let him be...

if u can make a tiny hole in the big end of the end and shine a torch in through the hole you can check if the chick is still alive and also if it doesnt hatch you know when to take it out.
Ronnie's Quails

I wouldn't normally advocate intervention, but since it is day 28 I'd be tempted to carefully make the hole a bit bigger (around the air sac or egg cavity) as Ronnie mentioned. Then wrap the rest of the egg in a warm damp tissue (don't cover the hole and the top of the egg). Then put him back in the incubator and leave him. Hopefully he will make his own way out.

The bobwhite has hatched (!!!!) and is rolling around the incubator. He seems to be pretty confused about how to move without being stuck inside an egg and doesn't seem to be able to uncurl his toes. He's also extremely skinny (not a surprise, since he hatched so late). I'm going to put a little bit of food and water in there and hope that he eats.

The process was pretty delicate.... I used tweezers to break the shell the same way that a chick normally would and then removed about half of the shell without disturbing the membrane. At this point, the chick started moving a lot more but didn't seem to be able to break free by himself (the membrane was pretty dry and not very flexible). Using Andoy's advice, I sprayed him down (gently) with some warm water and this seemed to do the trick. He freed himself from the rest of the shell in a matter of 5 minutes-- he was definitely too big to fit in that little egg! My primary worry now is that he can figure out how to walk properly. He doesn't have slayed legs and looks generally like a normal (but skinny) chick, so hopefully he will pull through. Is there anything I can do to help him figure out how to uncurl his toes?...

fingers crossed he pulls through for you, what an amazing story.

hi Mimi,

sounds like curled toes. Try this...

Simple curled toes fix

Well done for hatching the chick.

I hope all goes well for the little one.

Jo

Can we see a pic of the little survivor?

An amazingly beautiful story.

What a sappy guy!^

The little guy is now doing a bit better... he was too weak to eat or drink so I took the initiative and started hand-feeding him with the stuff that you would use to feed baby parrots. It's a bit unnerving since I don't want to accidentally cause him to inhale the food. But he has been steadily gaining in strength since I started doing it and is starting to act more and more like a regular chick (cheeping, wobbling around-- his toes seem to be starting to uncurl on their own too). I still don't know what the chances are that he will survive, but the signs are encouraging.

I'll post some pictures as soon as I can

Hi Mimi,

He may be able to eat chick crumb on his own. I have had chicks in worse condition than you describe, that could (with a little assistance) eat on their own. Try putting a bit of chick crumb in a shallow dish, or jar lid, and tap with your finger or a pencil in the crumb until he gets interested. Hope this works for the little tough guy!

He (lil bob) sounds as though he's suffering from wry neck as-well as curled toes ... both associated with prolonged hatching.

My advice would to be to dip his beak in water to make sure hes has fluids ....

I would imagine he will be dehydrated as well as emaciated as his yolk supply isn't designed to last an extra 5 days. If he's not up and running after and not attempting to eat after 12 hours, I would serious consider dong him the kindness of putting him to sleep as he's likely to be plagued with problems that usually result in death

Good luck with him

Suz

The little bob died this morning... sad but not entirely unexpected. Despite my efforts, it seems that his system was just too stressed by trying to suddenly adjust to the intake of food. He was unable to lift his head to eat or drink without help (I tried getting him to peck on his own, but he kept his eyes closed most of the time and was too weak to do anything). He was probably starving inside the egg for two days before the hatch, and just couldn't recover from it.

Although I usually discourage helping chicks to hatch, if anyone should ever have a situation like this (power outage or whatever the case may be), I definitely suggest removing half of the shell and wetting the membrane to help the chick free itself from the egg. For a normal hatch, however, I would discourage keeping eggs in the incubator for longer than 2 or 3 days after a hatch. In retrospect, I wish that I had helped this bob earlier, because, despite the circumstances, he may have been strong enough to survive if he had not been left in the egg (starving) for so long.

Thanks to everyone for your advice/support!

sorry to hear that

hi sorry to hear that but we know you did your best at the time . we can all
look back at times and think if only, I know we have.