Altitude where you live and incubate?

[valley ranch]

I like the close records you are keeping. I'll look forward to your results.
I didn't record the weight of the eggs or the size of the air cells. Darn! I do have other eggs I can check the average air cell size.
We here are at between 6500 and 6700 ft. My guess is our hatching conditions will be near as close as if we lived next door.

I appreciate the Emails! I print them so I can refer back to them. I''ve heard from people who have had good results with humidity ranging 30% differents from each other, some not worring unless it , the humidity, goes over 55% and others not worring unless it goes below 25%. If our instruments are calibrated properly/correctly some other factors are coming into play, like Altitude. I have altered the humidity, having heard from experienced hatchers and will adjust after our first candling.

Richard

 

[valley ranch]

I'll look forward to your results.

 

[FenDruadin]

I'm glad to find this thread!

My parents live at 9,000 ft, and they're trying to find new ways to grow food where they are. It's challenging at that altitude.

They're learning to garden up there, but eventually will want livestock. So I'm very interested to know how incubating is different--I realize 9,000 is a little different than 6,000, but it would be helpful to see how much of a difference it makes. Thanks for starting the thread!

 

[farmerlor]

We're at 6800 feet in Colorado and we run our sportsman at 40% for days 1-23 (hatching turkeys) and have about 95% hatch rate with home raised eggs. Shipped eggs is another story entirely.

 

[HorseFeatherz NV]

I am about 5000 feet and very, very dry here. It is a battle for humidity - everything dries out so quickly

I have a LG with fan and turner. I run *about* 30-35% for the first 18 days and then bump it up to 45/50 for the last 3.


I no longer keep track of humidity in the bator

The first 18 days, I just keep the central water res. filled then on lockdown I put a sourcream container filled with water and a wash cloth (cloth stick up in the air acting as a wick).

I am in the middle of a fertility test hatch for a friend right now. 8 out, 4 pipping and 10 waiting.

 

[bargain]

Quote:
We have found that our turkey eggs really like extra humidity. In fact with our turkeys, we dip them in warm water before we start the hatch - a trick from an older local farmer. Altitude is a little over 1100 feet here. Many times especially in spring and summer being the humid south our humidity is 50 to 60%... I'm trying to find if there is any average humidity available on line...

Looks like relative humidity varies between 50 and 80% on an average every month. Although we heat our house, it's really only in one room, so we don't loose a lot of the humidity others do when heating or air conditions... I will continue to watch this topic! Love it. Thanks for bringing it up...Happy new year's! Nancy

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[gryeyes]

I'm in the California Central Valley, at 15 feet altitude. I'm in the "Delta" area, sort of, and the Sacramento River is less than a mile from me, as is the Deep Water (Shipping) Channel to the Bay Area. Lots of irrigation creeks and ditches nearby. The hygrometer I just bought and haven't put into an incubator yet reads 40% now, read 39% earlier today. It's sitting here on the desk by my keyboard. Otherwise I wouldn't have a clue about humidity unless the news mentioned it.

I usually run 48% for Days 1 - 18, and bump up to 67% for lockdown. I just like those numbers.... and they've done well for me. Since the controls are the humidity pump are digital, I can set those numbers. With one of my other incubators without the humidity pump, I just try to keep the humidity close to those numbers. More of a range....

 

[debilorrah]

My hygrometer in the kitchen reads 25% - humidity wave!!!!

 

[bargain]

You know you're killing me Debi!!!! What I cannot figure is why our garden needs rain so much when the air is so humid....But poultry wise, why in the same hatch do I have eggs that don't make it through because of too much moisture and too little moisture...Got a cabinet, got calibrated! Now what's up????

 

[FenDruadin]

@bargain: Are your eggs all from the same breed/species? If so, you probably have some individuals within your flock laying particularly porous eggs--if they're porous, they'll lose humidity faster. Are you checking air cell growth during the course of incubation? If you are, you can help the slow-growing eggs out by spritzing them with water twice a day (sounds backward, but spritzing them actually helps moisture to evaporate out of the egg, thanks to the polarity of water molecules that causes them to want to follow each other... same principle that causes water droplets to join up in little rivulets on a windshield). Those that are losing moisture too fast can be placed closer to the source of humidity, and/or farther from the fan.

Speaking of which, proximity to the fan can affect moisture loss too, so that could be causing you problems. There are so many variables! But the best way to track a problem down is to start documenting everything--candle and mark the air cells at each candling. Record location in the incubator and level of porousness of the shells, anything you can think of, and see what correlates.

Good luck!