Abnormal air sac from high humidity - please help.

[TheCelloHatcher]

Hello hatchers,

I am currently on day 16 with a batch of chicken eggs. I candled last night and saw good development and movement in most, but almost every single one had a very small, nonexistent, or abnormally placed air sac. They were shipped, but I let them sit for about 36 hours before setting. I believe the cause was high humidity. The humidity fluctuated between 45 and 60%, occasionally getting as high as 70% from days 6-11, and slowly dropped back to normal by day 13 or 14. I know this is pretty bad and looking back, my climate and situation would have made a dry hatch a much better option.

Ether way, here I am and I would love any help you can give on how to maximize chances of a successful hatch.

 

[MGG]

Hello hatchers,

I am currently on day 16 with a batch of chicken eggs. I candled last night and saw good development and movement in most, but almost every single one had a very small, nonexistent, or abnormally placed air sac. They were shipped, but I let them sit for about 36 hours before setting. I believe the cause was high humidity. The humidity fluctuated between 45 and 60%, occasionally getting as high as 70% from days 6-11, and slowly dropped back to normal by day 13 or 14. I know this is pretty bad and looking back, my climate and situation would have made a dry hatch a much better option.

Ether way, here I am and I would love any help you can give on how to maximize chances of a successful hatch.

Unfortunately there's not much time left to get them to lose moisture now. Remove all of the water immediately and try to get the humidity as low as possible. I'd try to have it down in the teens until hatch day. Keep it as low as you can until you start seeing pips, then you can up it back to 65% or so.
Those high early humidity spikes are definitely your problem. You don't want to go over 40% humidity with chicken eggs until hatch day.

 

[TheCelloHatcher]

Unfortunately there's not much time left to get them to lose moisture now. Remove all of the water immediately and try to get the humidity as low as possible. I'd try to have it down in the teens until hatch day. Keep it as low as you can until you start seeing pips, then you can up it back to 65% or so.
Those high early humidity spikes are definitely your problem. You don't want to go over 40% humidity with chicken eggs until hatch day.

Yeah, I figured it's be a little late. I'll try and keep it low. Thanks for the help.

 

[mcdze]

lol, people and humidity .. 'normal' humidity in tropical places is near 100% most of the time and birds flourish .. i keep my incubator near 80% humidity from day1- hatch, it keeps temps even and stable in the bator which is the important factor .. where problems happen is forgetting about it, letting it dry out or get low, adding water, and conditions in an incubator go all over the place, from one spot inside to another actually .. yeah, that causes problems .. another condition that can happen with low humidity and a circulated air incubator anyway, is as per the above keeping the temp even throughout, if its on the dry side, the air forms 'layers' of circulation that vary in temp, so where youre reading it with your gauge, may be several degrees off of what the eggs are actually getting .. so .. just my take .. humidity in itself is a minor factor to the egg, but a major factor to incubator stability ..

 

[TheCelloHatcher]

lol, people and humidity .. 'normal' humidity in tropical places is near 100% most of the time and birds flourish .. i keep my incubator near 80% humidity from day1- hatch, it keeps temps even and stable in the bator which is the important factor .. where problems happen is forgetting about it, letting it dry out or get low, adding water, and conditions in an incubator go all over the place, from one spot inside to another actually .. yeah, that causes problems .. another condition that can happen with low humidity and a circulated air incubator anyway, is as per the above keeping the temp even throughout, if its on the dry side, the air forms 'layers' of circulation that vary in temp, so where youre reading it with your gauge, may be several degrees off of what the eggs are actually getting .. so .. just my take .. humidity in itself is a minor factor to the egg, but a major factor to incubator stability ..

That's true, didn't think about that. Thanks for the info.