Both those look good (I especially like the first) but I don’t trust any thermometer that has not been calibrated. For different reasons they can be off, I just don’t trust them. Calibration is not that hard for those two. Take a glass of warm water somewhere close to incubation temperature. That’s the range you are looking at anyway. Take a calibrated thermometer (I use an old medical thermometer) and stick it in the water. Put the probe from your thermometer in that water. See if they read the same. That medical thermometer only shows highs so you have to watch that. The hardest part of this may be finding a medical thermometer you can use this way with all the new stuff on the market.
You don’t mention if you have a forced air or still (thermal) air incubator. That can make it important where you take the temperature inside the incubator.
I use a different method for humidity. I do not candle or weight them to check on moisture loss. I use a hygrometer but have never calibrated it. I’ve learned through trial and error plus opening unhatched eggs that my sweet spot is when I have an average humidity on this hygrometer of around 39-40% throughout incubation. I keep track of humidity in the incubator and for how long it’s there. When the hygrometer shows the moisture is gone I change the humidity for the next round so that by 18 days I’m in that 39-40% ballpark. I control humidity by how many reservoirs I fill in the bottom of the incubator. Some incubators control it in other ways. You have to be a bit flexible in how you do it.
I’m not promoting my method over any other, we all do it different ways.
Canoe, a technical question, when do you weigh those eggs? Right after they are laid or just before they go in the incubator? How long you store them before incubation and how you store them can also have an effect, but if you store them very long they could lose some moisture before they go in. Just something to think about. As long as you don’t store them for a long time in low humidity conditions it’s pretty irrelevant.
I’m pretty sure Canoe will agree with what I’m about to say. Different humidities work better for different ones of us for many different reasons. Different eggs lose humidities at different rates, even in the same storage or incubating conditions. There is no one humidity that is perfect for each and every egg you are incubating. If you are weighing them or candling them do not go by one individual egg. You are looking at an average.
The good part of this is that there is a relatively wide range of weight loss that works, Nature was kind enough to not force us to be that precise. Still, there is a sweet spot you need to work toward.
Within tighter limits the same thing is true on incubation temperatures. You don’t want them to get hot enough to cook. Too cool and they won’t develop or at least won’t develop right. There is a range where you can still get good hatches, probably a full degree Fahrenheit high or low. The closer you can get it to right though the better off you are.
I hate to hear about your problems on that first hatch. You are right there is a learning curve. I admire you for trying to learn and your willingness to try it again. It’s not always temperature and humidity that cause total failures like that but they are prime suspects. Good luck on the next one.
Anyway, I want to evaluate my bator and see how accurate the humidity and temp are with recommended gauges. Please let me know what brand/type you trust. I have young children and would love for them to experience a successful hatch as they were so disappointed last time!
