Two Cranes have been sitting on nest for about 50 days. Will these 2 eggs hatch. They will not leave. It is their 3 Clutch. The first one resulted in a baby colt, but it got hit by car. The second never hatched.
What species of crane? Sandhill cranes have an incubation time of around 30 days, do you know the exact day of egg laying? Are you sure they haven't hatched and they are sitting on chicks? If you are getting close enough to the nest to see eggs or chicks, you might be too close and could be interfering with their natural behavior, unless they are captive or you are using a blind. You mentioned their chick being hit by a car, so if they are nesting that close to people, they may be nervous and are flushed from the nest too often to keep the eggs the right temperature. It's hard to say without more information. Edit: Extra cold weather can damage the eggs. It does seem like they've lost this clutch-50 days is long past when they should have hatched. They may be trying to incubate them anyway, I haven't worked directly with sandhills, but other birds that I've conducted nest monitoring studies on have sometimes sat on nests a while past when the eggs should have hatched. Hopefully this is actually their fourth clutch and you missed the removal of the third clutch. Good luck!
