Lots of embryo death in first 10 days😢

[My15Ducks]

Hi,
I’m doing my 2nd duck incubation in my incubator and my first one went very well, but this one is starting to look like it will be really bad.

I started with 42 eggs. It’s now day 9, and 11 have died. Some died in the first 4 days and developed blood rings. Others had died by day 7, and a couple more died between day 7 & 9. A few more are still moving slightly but it looks like the veins are disappearing. It’s very discouraging!

I’ve read all sorts of things can cause early embryo death. But it’s strange that I’m having much higher death rate than the last time which was just 2 months ago!

Could it be the bleach I used to clean the incubator? Could it be killing the embryos? I cleaned it twice: once after the last hatch and again a few days before putting the eggs in the incubator. Maybe I didn’t rinse it well enough?

I started with 42 eggs from my flock. The parents are all 1-3 years old. I feed them layer crumble and they have 24/7 pasture. This is unchanged from previous incubation.

My incubator is a forced air incubator with auto turner every 90 minutes.

The only major differences from the previous hatch:

1: I’m using the dry incubation method. Without adding water, my humidity has been 36-42%. Air cells looked great at day 7. Last time my humidity kept going to high and I switched to dry incubation for the last 2 weeks so this time I decided to try dry from the beginning.

2: I didn’t wash the eggs at all but I chose as clean eggs as possible. Last time I gently cleaned any slightly dirty egg with warm water.

At this point I am afraid they will all die.

I’ve already switched my ducks to Purina duck pellets in case the diet is a problem, but they were eating crumble last incubation.. so that’s probably not it.

Anyway, I know it’s probably impossible to guess what’s wrong but thanks for reading!

 

[My15Ducks]

I forgot to mention temperature: I’ve been checking the temp and humidity with both a Govee and a reptile thermometer. I didn’t have room for the Govee at first and just put it in now and then to check, but now I’m leaving it in full time. Today the Govee has been showing as low as 98.9 -99. Would that be low enough to kill them? I did bump up the temp after seeing it was low

 

[My15Ducks]

Day 10:
Only 23 eggs look healthy and are definitely alive .
6 others look iffy, of those a few are moving but don’t look good.

 

[Bigblackcat]

Hi,
I’m doing my 2nd duck incubation in my incubator and my first one went very well, but this one is starting to look like it will be really bad.

I started with 42 eggs. It’s now day 9, and 11 have died. Some died in the first 4 days and developed blood rings. Others had died by day 7, and a couple more died between day 7 & 9. A few more are still moving slightly but it looks like the veins are disappearing. It’s very discouraging!

I’ve read all sorts of things can cause early embryo death. But it’s strange that I’m having much higher death rate than the last time which was just 2 months ago!

Could it be the bleach I used to clean the incubator? Could it be killing the embryos? I cleaned it twice: once after the last hatch and again a few days before putting the eggs in the incubator. Maybe I didn’t rinse it well enough?

I started with 42 eggs from my flock. The parents are all 1-3 years old. I feed them layer crumble and they have 24/7 pasture. This is unchanged from previous incubation.

My incubator is a forced air incubator with auto turner every 90 minutes.

The only major differences from the previous hatch:

1: I’m using the dry incubation method. Without adding water, my humidity has been 36-42%. Air cells looked great at day 7. Last time my humidity kept going to high and I switched to dry incubation for the last 2 weeks so this time I decided to try dry from the beginning.

2: I didn’t wash the eggs at all but I chose as clean eggs as possible. Last time I gently cleaned any slightly dirty egg with warm water.

At this point I am afraid they will all die.

I’ve already switched my ducks to Purina duck pellets in case the diet is a problem, but they were eating crumble last incubation.. so that’s probably not it.

Anyway, I know it’s probably impossible to guess what’s wrong but thanks for reading!

They need the humidity. I’ve never heard of dry incubating, but it doesn’t sound right to me. I’ve hatched 100s of ducks. Most eggs are supposed to lose about 14% of their total weight in water during their incubation. So get the
on a .1gm scale, weigh them. depending on what type of duck it’s 25 to 28 days they lose a few grams a week of water if that number is not right then you know you need to upward or down the humidity. No water, no good-waterfowl. Clean the eggs with hydrogen peroxide and paper towels 3%, wipe with wet tow but don’t scrub them, waterfowl eggs can also be soaked for sometime if they’re really nasty.

 

[PrettyCoolChicks]

If your first hatch was successful, I would stick to the same method. It sounds like the "too high" humidity wasn't a problem the first time since most hatched, and as @Bigblackcat mentioned, waterfowl eggs need more water than say chicken. I "dry hatched" mine, but where i live that means humidity is around 70-90. Other people mist them with water daily.

If you've cleaned the bator with bleach few days before, I doubt there would be bleach fumes/evaporating. I personally also don't wash eggs before incubating and pick the clean ones, but that's it.

Did you candle the eggs before incubating? I had some quail eggs with thin cracks not visible to the naked eye. Maybe this time around some of your eggs were damaged, which might increase the risk of contamination?

But i think humidity is the problem, just based on the fact that is the main difference from your previous successful hatch.

 

[PrettyCoolChicks]

oh and the temperature should be fine, I think, if it gets too low hatching may be a bit later but it seems about right to me.

 

[Debbie292d]

I think sadly, it's obvious you changed hatching methods and that is what did it. I'd go back to the way you did the first one.

I too have heard of dry hatching but won't do it. My reasoning is, one, if the wheel isn't squeaky, don't grease it.

 

[Silkiebegins]

I did a dry hatch too and it did not go well.

 

[My15Ducks]

If your first hatch was successful, I would stick to the same method. It sounds like the "too high" humidity wasn't a problem the first time since most hatched, and as @Bigblackcat mentioned, waterfowl eggs need more water than say chicken. I "dry hatched" mine, but where i live that means humidity is around 70-90. Other people mist them with water daily.

If you've cleaned the bator with bleach few days before, I doubt there would be bleach fumes/evaporating. I personally also don't wash eggs before incubating and pick the clean ones, but that's it.

Did you candle the eggs before incubating? I had some quail eggs with thin cracks not visible to the naked eye. Maybe this time around some of your eggs were damaged, which might increase the risk of contamination?

But i think humidity is the problem, just based on the fact that is the main difference from your previous successful hatch.

Thank you everyone for the replies. It does seem like changing incubation methods was a stupid idea

I did candle them before setting and there were no cracks. All beautiful healthy looking eggs.

I did raise the humidity. It might be too late but maybe it will help the survivors. I have it at about 45-55% now.

The eggs are on day 13 and it looks like there are 21 still alive and healthy. I’m cooling and misting daily now as well.

I will try again after these ones hatch and go back to the higher humidity

 

[PrettyCoolChicks]

It's not stupid to try things, ad we all learn by making mistakes! Sometimes trial and error is the only way to know if something can work for you/your set-up. And it's not too late to adjust as long as some of the eggs are alive... Keep us updated on how the remaining eggs are doing! I'm rooting for them