Many vertebrates have been shown to sense magnetic fields and align, in certain situations, their body axis along magnetic field lines. In an attempt to replicate earlier studies on magnetic alignment of chick embryos we incubated White Leghorn chicken eggs for three days and analyzed the embryo alignment axis in relation to topographic north and magnetic north, which we manipulated between trials. Overall the embryos did not follow the magnetic field alignments, however, they showed a strong clustering response to an unidentified non-magnetic factor. Reanalysis of a previously published dataset also revealed a significant topographic orientation towards the same general direction. However, further studies at different global locations are needed to solve these puzzling findings from two independent studies concerning very consistent embryo axis alignment of early chick embryos. Our study emphasizes the importance of experimental designs that allow clear decoupling of topographic effects from magnetic effects.