Average Hatch Rate Thread

[waldeneffect]

Our third round of incubation was the best yet.

My wife made a blog post about the experience complete with a handsome graph.

http://www.avianaquamiser.com/posts/Round_3_hatch_rate/

 

[MeepBeep]

Seems like an older post with low activity, but anyway...

First post here, sort of a newbie sort of not, did some hatching 25 years ago or so but that was a long time ago so it's basically all new... Maybe beginners luck

I want to make a 'What I did post' but it's going to have to wait until this run of hatching is over and I can take some pictures of the mods I did to the cheap incubator, and compose the thread... But the short of it, incubation is being done in a Farm Innovations foam incubator with a few quick low cost mods... It's set in my basement where the ambient temps are really steady, and I have been hand turning the eggs 3 times a day myself, give or take every 8 hours... There has been no 'lock down' as I have had to turn the 'not due' eggs... I have been candling all eggs regularly, say every 3-5 days... I work from home so the incubator is monitored about every hour or 2 for temp/humidity during my waking hours just because it's there...

Anyway here goes, don't want to hear "you shouldn't be doing it this way" reply's as I believe my hatch rate thus far speaks for itself on how meticulous and careful I'm being knowing it's not standard procedure... I'll also update this thread/post as the run continues as this is a mixed batch, mixed time incubation that will go on for at least another month, or until my peafowl/guineafowl egg supplier dries up for the year...

All infertile eggs were not counted they are pulled between 7-10 days, I have to admit there might have been an early termination in the infertile pulls as well but honestly they all looked pretty darn clear and infertile to me when candled, so I'm sticking with infertile... Either way those infertile eggs have only totaled 5, out of the entire mixed run thus far of over 50 eggs, so it's a small percentage...

May 24 - 1 full size chicken egg set 1 hatched 100%
May 24 - 3 bantam chicken eggs set 3 hatched 100%
May 24 - 5 peafowl eggs set 5 hatched 100% (I assisted on two of these hatches)
May 30 - 4 bantam chicken eggs set all 4 hatched 100%

May 30 - 4 peafowl eggs set (candling looks great, but one egg is really underweight compared to the others, might be my first dud)
May 30 - 2 guineafowl eggs set (candling looks great)
June 3 - 3 bantam chicken eggs set (all three pipped into air sack today)

Additional peafowl and guineafowl eggs set June 4, 12, 20, 22 will update progress later

I hold my breath every hatch day waiting for the first dud, but so far luck has been on my side...

 

[Poppetpix]

My first hatch. I had 10 eggs, 6 hatched (but one died after he drowned himself).

 

[kaitlynn1120]

im so confused. lol okay im doing a science paper on this. I got a new incubator and I need to find out the percentage rate of the eggs I have in the incubator. I had 9 eggs before in the incubator but none of them hatched. So the #eggs I have is 10 right s now I had 9 in there before so do I add them together? And I have chicks but I didn't hatch them from this incubator. so I cant really find the percentage if I never had any chicks hatch from this incubator.

 

[Mrs. K]

In the new incubator if I am understanding you, you tried 9 and zero hatched, so that is a 0% hatch.

Now you have 10 eggs in this new incubator and you are wanting to find the percentage that the new incubator hatched?

so you would add the 9 + 10 = 19 eggs that you have attempted to hatch. Now say with the second hatch you get 8 eggs to hatch.

Take 8 and divide it by 19, which will give you a decimal, and you move the decimal two places to the right to get the percent

8 / 19 = .42 which = 42%

I am a math teacher, if that helps

Mrs K

 

[TNSS11]

This post contains a link with a free spreadsheet from Mother Earth News. It will help you keep records of your hatch rates.

http://goo.gl/PNmjDA

 

[HiggsField]

I've just finished hatching my first batch of the year. I changed my approach just a bit and got stellar results. First I did not add any water to the incubator at all until one day before hatching. Average humidity during this time was 27%. I also did not open the incubator at all during this period - no candling of the eggs. I added warm water to the tray one day prior to the hatch date, and raised the humility to 75%. I also removed the eggs from the auto-turner and placed them onto wire mesh. During the hatch itself the humidity climbed to above 90% for to the duration, with moisture coming from the newly hatched chicks. I kept the incubator closed for 3 days (18 hours past the peak hatch time). There were at least 6 later comers to the party. Two had to be helped from their shells as the humidity was starting to drop down below %70.

Total number of eggs: 44
Total clears (not fertilized): 5
Total early death (red ring): 1
Total fully developed but failed to hatch: 3
Total hatchings: 35

Percentage hatch rate: 90%

 

[KYBOY]

First hatch of the year(Im running late) and I kinda messed up to. Wrote down the wrong date on the calendar and had chicks pipping in the turner..So I messed up the last three days humidity..Still I had 24 of 32 hatch for 75%..

 

[WalnutHill]

First hatch of the year(Im running late) and I kinda messed up to. Wrote down the wrong date on the calendar and had chicks pipping in the turner..So I messed up the last three days humidity..Still I had 24 of 32 hatch for 75%..

As long as humidity goes up when pipping starts, it's good. The larger incubators, though, can take more time to bring humidity up so I try to hit the day before I expect the first pip, so generally 2 days before hatch.

Taking out of the turner, though...wow that could have been a disaster if you weren't there.

 

[Allie3513]

Do you count the infertile eggs and the ones that did not make it to lock down?