Whether you want to raise your own chicks or are just curious about the process, hatching eggs is fun and educational. With proper care and attention, you can hatch a successful brood of baby chickens. But it takes time and patience to properly prepare, incubate and troubleshoot. This article will walk you through every step of hatching eggs to get your chicks to the finish line.

Before beginning incubation, make sure your incubator is clean and sanitized, with the correct temperature and humidity. Once everything is ready to go, turn your eggs at least twice a day to prevent the egg from becoming misshapen due to varying air pressures in the incubator.

After a few days, you should notice tiny dots on the surface of your egg. These spots are called pipping, and they indicate that the embryo is preparing to hatch. Using a hygrometer or other moisture gauge, keep the humidity between 60-75% during incubation. This is much higher than what is normally found in a house, but it’s important for successful hatching.

Once the pipping starts, it can take hours for each chick to crack its way out of the egg shell. During this time it will chip away at the top of the eggshell and will stop to rest periodically. Once the chick makes it to the other end of the egg, it will use its feet to push the shell off of itself and onto the ground. After the chick is fully outside of the shell, it will often lay down and close its eyes.

Chicks are herd animals and need to be in a group to survive. A lone chick can actually die from loneliness, so don’t try to “help” it by picking at its shell or removing it. This is dangerous and can cause the chick to bleed and die.

On day 5, you’ll be able to see little spider-like markings in the yolk area of your egg when you candle it. These are blood vessels, and they will become more prominent over the next few days as the embryo prepares to hatch.

By day 18, the chick will assume the ‘hatch position’ by turning its head towards the blunt end of the egg, tucking it under its right wing and curling its feet up toward its head. It will then break through the ‘air sac’ at the blunt end of the egg, and will begin pecking the shell away.

Knowing the history of your eggtopsy will help you understand why some eggs didn’t hatch. If you had a power outage or other issue that affected the eggs at any point during incubation, the eggtopsy can help you recognize that cause so that you can avoid it in future hatches. Knowing that you had a humidity problem may help you resolve it. Keeping detailed notes and learning to read your eggtopsy will make you a better chicken incubateur.