Anybody interested in an incubation project?

[Susan Skylark]

Some time ago I tried incubating some chicken fridge eggs and got development in 7/9 eggs despite being over a week in the fridge. It is commonly assumed that fridge eggs have a lower hatch rate because of temp, but in my micro experiment it didn’t impede development, but most of the eggs were stuck to the inside of the shell (not turned in fridge). What if the low hatching rate comes from not turning rather than low temp? I want to try a little experiment in a few weeks when my incubator is open but it will only hold 16 eggs or so, hardly enough to be statistically significant. Is anybody interested in doing the same thing with their own eggs and incubator? I’ll put together a little guide and record sheet if there’s any interest (check back here soon!). It doesn’t matter what species you have or the size of your incubator, as long as you can reliably treat all eggs the same save for the project parameters. Obviously there is some risk of lower hatch rates, higher embryonic death, and maybe complications at hatch so don’t do this with valuable eggs or if you have a tough time with tough or bad hatches! It could be a sort of participatory hatch-along that might actually contribute something interesting to our knowledge of incubation. This is completely voluntary and unscholarly, but could be really interesting, sort of a crowd sourced science fair project! What do you think?

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Low hatch rate is most likely due to not turning.
When you say, "not turning rather than low temp?" do you mean the low temperature from being refrigerated?
Low temp prior to incubation isn't a problem. It doesn't matter much what the temp is pre-incubation as long as it is above freezing. Freezing causes crystallization in the yolk and other important structures. Once the egg is laid, the temperature immediately drops. It doesn't matter what it drops to as long as the temperature remains constant until the pre-incubation warmup. So ideally, one temp change post laying and one for incubation is the most stabilizing factor.
On the other hand, the more frequent the turning the higher the hatchability. Other than daily turning during storage, frequent turning should commence as soon as incubation commencing.

 

[Susan Skylark]

I'm trying to 'prove' that it is a lack of turning that affects hatchability rather than storage temperature pre-incubation. The internet seems to believe that fridge eggs don't develop as well as eggs stored at room temp (or a little colder). I got 7/9 fridge eggs to develop so it appears (in my tiny experiment) that temp does not affect development. My proposition is that it is lack of daily turning that reduces hatchability rather than storage temp. To that end my trial will consist of three sets (fourth optional control) of room temp eggs that are not turned, and two sets of fridge eggs that are either turned or not and then to compare development and hatch rates between the sets. There is a lot of speculation/tradition out there about what temp hatching eggs should be stored at, especially for neophytes and small scale folks who don't have a controlled storage environment for hatching eggs. One benefit of exploring this is to ease peoples' concerns about actual pre-incubation storage temp (as long as it is above freezing and below whatever temp induces development) and focus on making sure they are turning their stored eggs instead. And it will be fun at least to us geeky weirdos out there

 

[NatJ]

My proposition is that it is lack of daily turning that reduces hatchability rather than storage temp. To that end my trial will consist of three sets (fourth optional control) of room temp eggs that are not turned, and two sets of fridge eggs that are either turned or not and then to compare development and hatch rates between the sets.

You are talking about turning or not turning during storage, right?
And then all batches get turned during incubation?

 

[Susan Skylark]

Yes, the only variables will be pre-incubation storage temp (fridge or room temp) and pre-incubation turning (yes or no), all eggs will be incubated together according to species/incubator parameters/requirements and turned during incubation.

 

[NatJ]

Yes, the only variables will be pre-incubation storage temp (fridge or room temp) and pre-incubation turning (yes or no), all eggs will be incubated together according to species/incubator parameters/requirements and turned during incubation.

I will be watching with interest to see what the results are, but unfortunately I can't join in at this time.

 

[Susan Skylark]

Here's my proposed fridge egg protocol for any interested perusers, tried to attach a word file but it wouldn't let me, let me know if it is unclear or I need to tweak anything!:

Fridge Egg Research Protocol:

Hypothesis: It is the lack of daily turning of stored fertile eggs rather than the storage temperature that results in lower hatch rates in refrigerated eggs.

Participation Requirements:

• Access to hatching eggs (any domestic poultry species) and an incubator
• Prior knowledge of hatching eggs (this isn’t your first hatch!)
• Ability to monitor and record all pertinent data
• Completely voluntary with no financial compensation
• Willing to risk lower hatch rates, higher embryonic death, and hatching complications
• Ability to adhere to the protocol
• Ability to appropriately deal with resulting chicks
• You can remain anonymous and no personal information will be collected or required
• 
  
• Protocol:
  • All eggs must be treated exactly the same, save for the tested parameters (pre-incubation temp and turning)
  • Eggs must be marked by treatment group and either randomly or equally distributed
  • Collect more eggs than needed for the protocol
  • Only place excellent incubation candidates into the incubator and don’t set more eggs than your set-up is meant to handle
  • Use whatever your preferred incubation/lockdown settings for species and equipment
  • Candling eggs at various points is helpful but not required if you don’t like it or are not proficient
  • Make sure to open all unhatched eggs (either when candled and removed or after hatch)
  • Record all accidents, incidents, special situations (cracked an egg, incubator broke, etc.)
  • The more eggs the better the data, but only if you can reasonably handle them!
  • Record data as you go, rather than trying to remember it later!
  • Make sure your fridge isn’t cold enough to freeze the eggs!
  • Have fun!
  • 
    
  • There will be 3-4 treatment groups, depending on your set-up and the number of eggs you can reasonably be expected to incubate. If you can manage 100 eggs, 4 sets of 25 would be awesome, but if you can only fit 16, 3 groups of 5 are better than 4 groups of 4.
    • Begin collecting eggs, first day of collection/day laid will be Day 0 of pre-incubation.
    • Collect enough eggs to meet your goal as well as some extra (no weird eggs please: double yolks, soft shell, cracks, extra large or small, etc.).
    • Collect eggs for no more than a 72 hour period, even if this means you are short on eggs!
    • Divide eggs randomly or evenly between your treatment groups (make sure each group is divided fairly evenly between sires, lines, breed, age of hen, etc.)
    • Mark each egg as to group (below) and day collected (Day 0-2).
    • The treatment groups:
      • Group A: Room Temp, no turning
      • Group N: Room Temp, turned daily (this is the optional control group, if you don’t have room for more than 20 eggs, don’t do this one)
      • Group B: Fridge, no turning
      • Group C: Fridge, turned daily
    • Divide each day’s collection evenly between the groups and immediately store either in the fridge or at room temp, turning and storage conditions should be the same protocol between groups (ie. turn twice, stored wide end up or turn once, stored on side, whatever), the only difference is if they are turned and where they are stored
    • Store eggs for a minimum of 72 hours (3 days) and for a maximum of 7 days with no more than a 72 hour window in which eggs were collected, all eggs go into the incubator together!
      • Example: you collect your 27 eggs on Day 0, they are divided into 3 groups and stored/treated appropriately for 76.3 hours. On Day 3 of pre-incubation you place them in the incubator and reset to Day 0 of incubation.
      • Example 2: It takes you 3 days to collect enough eggs, you mark each collected the first day with a 0, on the second with a 1, and on the third with a 2. You place each egg into a group the day it is collected and begin storing/treating each group and adding to it daily. By day 2 you don’t have quite enough eggs, but per protocol parameters, you can’t collect any more as it will throw off the data. While the Day 0 eggs are now ready to go in the incubator, you have to wait until the Day 2 eggs are old enough as you want them all to go into the incubator at once. On Day 5, the newest eggs are now ready to go in so you can start incubation.
    • If you are comfortable candling, candling your eggs for early signs of development/infertility (Day 3-6ish) would be great but if you are not proficient or don’t like candling, this is completely optional. If you are proficient and feel comfortable, pull dead or infertile eggs at this point, making sure to open each and record the results (infertile, early embryonic death, defective, etc.).
    • Move eggs around the incubator every few days so no single egg is in any particular spot/row/column the whole time (minimizes the effects of cold/warm spots on development).
    • Continue to incubate eggs per your preference and candle again (if comfortable) around the second third of incubation (Day 10-20 depending on species!). Remove any eggs that aren’t developing, if comfortable, again open and record data.
    • Take eggs through lockdown and hatching, candling again if you wish.
    • Watch hatching eggs closely, and make sure to record irregularities such as defects, assisted hatching, etc.
    • After hatch, make sure your data is correct, honest, and complete and attach to the official project hatch-along.
    • Any collected data will be pooled and we’ll see if the hypothesis is correct or needs some adjustment!
    • I'll get a data collection post up too!

 

[Susan Skylark]

Here's the proposed data collection, wanted to attach a spreadsheet but again I couldn't! Let me know if anything is confusing or amiss!

Data to be collected (per hatch):

Species Hatched:
Type of Incubator:
Years of Hatching Experience:
Date First Eggs Gathered:
Date Last Eggs Gathered:
Date Eggs Set in Incubator:
Number of Groups:
Total Number of Eggs Set:
Incubator Avg Temp:
Incubator Avg Humidity:
Candling (Y/N):
Candling Day(s) (of incubation):
Lockdown Date:
Lockdown Avg Temp:
Lockdown Avg Humidity:
Hatch Date(s):
Group Data (record for each group):

Group A: Room Temp, no turning.
Number of Eggs:
Avg. Storage Temp:
Position/How Stored (on side, wide end up, at an angle?):

Group B: fridge, daily turning.
Number of Eggs:
Avg. Storage Temp:
How many times turned daily:
Position/How Stored (on side, wide end up, at an angle?):

Group C: fridge, no turning.
Number of Eggs:
Avg. Storage Temp:
Position/How Stored (on side, wide end up, at an angle?):

Group N (optional control): Room Temp, daily turning.
Number of Eggs:
Avg. Storage Temp:
How many times turned daily:
Position/How Stored (on side, wide end up, at an angle?):

Individual Egg Data (record for each egg):

Group (A-C, N):
Day Collected (0-2):
Candled (Y/N):
Candling Day(s) (of Incubation):
Day (of incubation) Removed/Opened (or NA):
Infertile/No Development (Y/N):
Early Embryonic Death (First half of incubation, Y/N):
Late Embryonic Death (Second half of incubation Y/N):
Failure to Hatch (Fully formed chick but died in shell, Y/N):
Hatch Day (Day of incubation or NA):
Assisted Hatch (Y/N):
Deformed Chick (Y/N):
Weak Chick (Y/N):
Notes:

 

[MrsWinterWheat]

I am really interested in this hypothesis!
I had read before to leave shipped eggs 24 hours before incubating and leave 3-4 days before turning on the turner. I had done that with my first batch of eggs of Guinea fowl. I had 16 eggs and out of that 5 were infertile, 9 were quitters, and 2 hatched. But those two did not make it. So my hatch rate was 18.2% of those fertile, 12.5% for the total eggs… with 0% survival rate.

This last hatch I had 32 eggs and only rested them 8 hours and started turning them right away. 7 of them were infertile, I had 8 quitters and so far 14 hatched. I still have 3 eggs in the incubator, one is actively hatching and the other has internal pip…the third is iffy. So if we went with 7 infertile, 9 quitters, and 16 hatch it would be a significant improvement.
64% hatch rate fertile and 50% overall hatch rate.

 

[Susan Skylark]

I’ve done the 24 hours sit at room temp with wide ends up on shipped eggs but that 3-4 days no turning sounds questionable. This could be really interesting!