You can determine whether eggs are fertile approximately five days after the hen begins sitting tight. The best point at which to check is five days after incubation has begun, which is usually five days after the third egg is laid. A special device called a candler is used to do this. You should get one of these inexpensive tools because they have a special protective hood that prevents you from chipping the egg first shows little red veins. As the chick develops, the veins are no longer visible and the egg becomes darker where the body is developing. Infertile eggs, known as clear, have a pale yellow appearance with no dark formations.

Approximately 23 days after an egg is laid, the chick can take up 24 hours to work its way fully out of the shell. I have rarely found it necessary to help a lovebird chick hatch. Some species, such as Abyssinian lovebirds , can take even longer to extricate themselves from the egg. Overly nervous breeders often interfere with this process, afraid the chick is taking too long to hatch. This is often a mistake and can actually harm the chick more than it helps. If for some reason you feel it is necessary to help the chick, the egg must be removed slowly, a little bit every hour rather than all at once. The chick should always be left attached to the soft material inside the egg. This egg sac contains essential nutrition that the chick will absorb If you remove this material, the chick will die. In most cases, helping the chick from the egg is a mistake. If done improperly, it will result in the death of the chick. If you continually have problems with chicks unable to extricate themselves from the shell on their own, you may have an aviary management issue, such as too much calcium in the diet, causing excessive hardness of the shell.

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