Simulated Natural Nest Incubation~Experiment #1 So it begins....

[RoseMarie1]

OK...Day 18 and last night to be turning....except...the air cells do not look like day 18 air cells. They haven't advanced much past the 14 day mark and most are barely even tilted over, so I'm thinking this hatch is going to go over a day or so. What do you all think? I know Pete had said that at the time of hatch the air cells for his dry hatch are almost 1/3 the total egg area and mine are most definitely not even close to that.

Anyhoo....marked them anyway and have tried to put the most dippy portion of the air cell upright in the nest. I have a feeling I'll be candling~carefully~in the following days to see how and if those air cells enlarge a bit and start to tilt more so I can see the most likely to pip areas.

Nest temps are trying to get a little hot on me in these warm temps but I've solved that a bit by using a fan in the room to move that warm air out. It seems to be working quite well. It's not aimed at the nest box but rather towards the middle of the room.

Getting excited!!!

yea!!!!!!

with you!!!

in fact I'm giddy!!!!

yeaaaaaa!!!! I started my eggs today and yours are on day 18. cool cool cool got a whole bator full of em this time and starting on another one to.

I hope ALL of them hatch for you this time!!!!

praying they all do anyway!!!

 

[ocap]

Okay...I think I missed something somewhere or my brain is fuzzy tonight...hatcher? There are separate areas in an incubator or do some folks just remove the egg turner or is there a whole separate unit called a hatcher? Pics?

I purchased an incubator that I can grow into, then I discovered that trying to have more than one hatch date in the incubator was not compatible with low humidity in the first 18 days and high humidity in the last 7 days. so.....I bought a incubator to hatch in, then I found this thread.

 

[Cowpoke]

I didn't...the pad was just lying on top of the eggs all this time, but now I've put a spacer of the wire fencing between the eggs and the pad..it's just arched a little to hold the heating pad off the eggs. Since I couldn't go any further down on the controls this was the only way I could figure to lower the temps and it worked great. First I tried to insert a felt sheet between the pad and the eggs but it didn't make a difference.

Oh, ok Bee; I see. And I'm glad that worked out for you.

 

[aussie pete]

hi Jules,don't worry too much ,air cells grow till approx day 18.

despite all my efforts in weighting eggs & candling air cells to check on progress,they r only a guide for my info to minimize problems.

of the 19 of mine that hatched out of 22 good eggs at day18 ,while the air cells were of a good size,the egg weights varied from a loss of 7% to 14 % with an ave of 10%,.
the ideal i was aiming for, was a 14% weight loss.

they're a lot of pre-set variables that also impact on hatch rates,

each egg is an individual & contains a lot of variables,each "set" has variables from same dad to different mum,different nutrient levels ( even thou all parents had same feed) ,collection,handling,storage etc

u only have to glance thru all the threads on here about incubating ,to see that while,it is said to be simple to hatch chicks,some ppl seem to find it has a lot of complications

every hatch for each individual is different ,some ppl accept a hatch rate of 30% & think it is great ,others get a hatch rate of 90% plus

given all efforts u have put into this hatch & the lessons u learned from the previous attempts ,I'm have faith this"set" will have an acceptable hatch rate for u


cheers Pete

 

[Cowpoke]

OK...Day 18 and last night to be turning....except...the air cells do not look like day 18 air cells. They haven't advanced much past the 14 day mark and most are barely even tilted over, so I'm thinking this hatch is going to go over a day or so. What do you all think? I know Pete had said that at the time of hatch the air cells for his dry hatch are almost 1/3 the total egg area and mine are most definitely not even close to that.

Anyhoo....marked them anyway and have tried to put the most dippy portion of the air cell upright in the nest. I have a feeling I'll be candling~carefully~in the following days to see how and if those air cells enlarge a bit and start to tilt more so I can see the most likely to pip areas.

Nest temps are trying to get a little hot on me in these warm temps but I've solved that a bit by using a fan in the room to move that warm air out. It seems to be working quite well. It's not aimed at the nest box but rather towards the middle of the room.

Getting excited!!!

It was good idea to start moving some air to help control the temp and to ventilate. Anxiously waiting for the hatch and praying for you to have a Good Hatch!

 

[Beekissed]

hi Jules,don't worry too much ,air cells grow till approx day 18.

despite all my efforts in weighting eggs & candling air cells to check on progress,they r only a guide for my info to minimize problems.

of the 19 of mine that hatched out of 22 good eggs at day18 ,while the air cells were of a good size,the egg weights varied from a loss of 7% to 14 % with an ave of 10%,.
the ideal i was aiming for, was a 14% weight loss.

they're a lot of pre-set variables that also impact on hatch rates,

each egg is an individual & contains a lot of variables,each "set" has variables from same dad to different mum,different nutrient levels ( even thou all parents had same feed) ,collection,handling,storage etc

u only have to glance thru all the threads on here about incubating ,to see that while,it is said to be simple to hatch chicks,some ppl seem to find it has a lot of complications

every hatch for each individual is different ,some ppl accept a hatch rate of 30% & think it is great ,others get a hatch rate of 90% plus

given all efforts u have put into this hatch & the lessons u learned from the previous attempts ,I'm have faith this"set" will have an acceptable hatch rate for u


cheers Pete

Thanks, Pete! I was hoping you'd chime in on that! I was thinking sort of the same thing....I think I'll only have 50% hatch rate on this and it's kind of discouraging when folks say they usually have 100% hatch rates and such.....but I guess that's pretty much an exception and not the rule, because I read many, many posts about folks who set 18 and have 3 that hatch and are quite happy about that.

I'll be happy if I have ANY hatch and are vigorous enough to live well because it's the method that is being tested and not so much my own flock's fecundity or my incubation skills. I just wish someone more experienced than I in incubation would try this method, with better eggs, so that its true potential could be explored. I think it has merit and once you cut through how to work this nest, it's quite easy to work and manage compared to other methods of incubation......lot of folks out there having trouble managing temps and humidity in real incubators, so this one seems easier to me when you don't have to manage humidity much at all, just the temps. And even then they seem very stable considering the box is sitting in an area where the ambient temps and humidity are constantly shifting.

Thanks for the encouragement....I was needing it. Thank you ALL for all the encouragement....I could not have done this whole thing without all the helpful information, encouraging words and the sounding board for ideas and my flagging hopes.

It was good idea to start moving some air to help control the temp and to ventilate. Anxiously waiting for the hatch and praying for you to have a Good Hatch!

Thank you so very much, Cowpoke!

I really need the prayers for this hatch and they add to my own....was just doing that 18 day candling last night and thanking the Lord for each little wiggling chick in the eggs and lamenting each one that didn't show any life anymore. I think I have 3-4 that died for some reason as they have turned very dark and the contents slosh a little too much...and the air cells look very red like the egg is filled with blood. Those eggs are also colder than the others, so I'm thinking they are dead.

I know it's nature's way of weeding out the ones that were not right in some way but it's still sad all the same...any time a life is extinguished and especially in a baby creature, it's a sadness of the soul to see it happen.

 

[LindaB220]

Keeping up with you , Bee, but I have absolutely no input.

Still reading. And learning.

 

[TexasLisa]

Bee, you know I am praying for you and your eggs! Hang in there. It won't be much longer.

Lisa

 

[AmericanMom]

Where did the time go?? Is it already time (or near time) for those little chicks to make an appearance??

Good luck Bee!!!!

 

[Beekissed]

Will you guys hold my hand and help me breathe when the pains get closer together?

That's sort of what it feels like.....dreading but hoping, praying they will all hatch normally and be healthy, scared I'll have to help or make a decision to not help, afraid I'll do something wrong again andharm a chick, etc. In the back of my mind I keep thinking, "WHY did you even start this thing????" and it's much like a woman in labor....funny, isn't it?

Oh, the drama of it all......