Bob Blosl's Heritage Large Fowl Thread

[saladin]

How do you prewarm your eggs?
Before I add any eggs to my incubator I use one of several methods. I either :
Add bottles of hot water to the container and cover with a towel,
or I microwave those rice bags and wrap in a towel, top with the eggs and a towel,
or I dampen a towel and microwave it for 30 seconds and wrap the eggs in that.

As long as they are room temp (say 65F) then you are fine.

I've taken them straight from the 35F outdoors to the incubator for the past 40 plus years with no problems whatsoever. Some things you hear are way over-rated.

 

[ashandvine]

As long as they are room temp (say 65F) then you are fine.

I've taken them straight from the 35F outdoors to the incubator for the past 40 plus years with no problems whatsoever. Some things you hear are way over-rated.

Really? Do you have some alarm that sounds when an egg lands? My eggs out in the barn and cottage are cold! I have no idea how long they are cold either so I don't incubate them.

 

[mschlumb]

Really?  Do you have some alarm that sounds when an egg lands?  My eggs out in the barn and cottage are cold!  I have no idea how long they are cold either so I don't incubate them.

The rule I always use in winter is if the egg is not cracked, it goes in the incubator. Otherwise I'd never get anything hatched when I want to

 

[gjensen]

How do you prewarm your eggs?
Before I add any eggs to my incubator I use one of several methods. I either :
Add bottles of hot water to the container and cover with a towel,
or I microwave those rice bags and wrap in a towel, top with the eggs and a towel,
or I dampen a towel and microwave it for 30 seconds and wrap the eggs in that.

I do not prewarm them. I believe the incubator will. I just inspect the eggs, sit them on top of the incubator, and set them with what I might that evening.

I do not see warming them, when the incubator will, and I don't see settling them. If they need settling, though I do not understand that, they will settle in the incubator. The egg turner is very slow.

I am not knocking these techniques. Maybe they help, but I never understood how they did. I always figured that the sooner I got them in the incubator the better. If they do not help, then we are complicating it for nothing.

I would be hard to argue either way, because there are so many variables in shipping.

 

[saladin]

Really? Do you have some alarm that sounds when an egg lands? My eggs out in the barn and cottage are cold! I have no idea how long they are cold either so I don't incubate them.

For those of us in the deep South we seldom have temps in the day below 35F; at night it might go down to 20F, but the chickens lay during the day and not at night.

 

[gjensen]

For those of us in the deep South we seldom have temps in the day below 35F; at night it might go down to 20F, but the chickens lay during the day and not at night.

Even our 20 degree nights are not often. I complain that it is cold , if it is 35 at dawn.

 

[NanaKat]

Quote: How do you prewarm your eggs?

Before I add any eggs to my incubator I use one of several methods. I either :
Add bottles of hot water to the container and cover with a towel,
or I microwave those rice bags and wrap in a towel, top with the eggs and a towel,
or I dampen a towel and microwave it for 30 seconds and wrap the eggs in that.
I was interested in the bolded comment above.when I posted my question. I don't add eggs to a currently loaded incubator without prewarming them for the very same reason.

 

[catdaddyfro]

I'm a firm believer that the natural selection/survival of the fittest process starts in the development of the embryo right through pipping and then being able to get out of the egg and up and about all on its own. Any intervention or help throws this all out the backdoor with the wash-water. If its meant to be then so shall it.

Now with that being said, when you ship the egg a thousand miles cross country in a rough 18 wheeler or it flies up in the sky at 30,000 feet for 4-8 hours, the letting the eggs settle or warming them up or what ever little tricks you may have just probly won't matter. It then all comes into the playing a game of chance if you get anything to happen or not with those eggs. Just saying, and me, I just hope some of the ones I get shipped to me this season will do alright, if not then I've all ready expected the worst and hoped for the best.

Jeff

 

[catdaddyfro]

I was interested in the bolded comment above.when I posted my question. I don't add eggs to a currently loaded incubator without prewarming them for the very same reason.

You know I don't really get this either for this reason:

When I let my hens do a natural hatching of a setting of eggs, they will usually at least once a day get off their nest to evacuate their systems and refill them. During all this time those eggs are cooling down to just about ambient temperature. I usually have about 95-100% hatch rate with those broody girls. As a matter of fact my grandad taught me how to incubate eggs 40 years ago with his old Montgomery Wards goose egg incubator. It would hold probly 150 chicken eggs and there was no turner in it. It would take a while to turn all those eggs by hand and then he would go off and do his morning and evening feedings then come back by and place the top back on. I remember he always had good hatches come off too using this process. Now days people will almost have a tizzy if they think the temps drop down an inth/fraction of a degree(thanks to the digital era)LOL much less leave the 'bator' lid open just long enough to candle the eggs. I think some of the reasons for eggs starting to pip much less hatch on day 18/19 is because these eggs are kept too warm for too long and this may also have a not so desirable after effect too, maybe some of the eggs that do hatch maybe were'nt supposed to naturally.(natural culling) just thinking outloud here.

Man has intervened in a lot of stuff he should have left up to Mother Nature and some have proven disasterous too.

Jeff

 

[Bentley]

How do you prewarm your eggs?
Before I add any eggs to my incubator I use one of several methods. I either :
Add bottles of hot water to the container and cover with a towel,
or I microwave those rice bags and wrap in a towel, top with the eggs and a towel,
or I dampen a towel and microwave it for 30 seconds and wrap the eggs in that.

Pre-warming hatching eggs does not need to be fast at all. As a matter of fact, the main reason you would pre-warm eggs is if they are going into an incubator that already contains other eggs. Again, you are just trying to prevent the OTHER eggs from damage or stress due to the possible cooling of the incubator when the new eggs that are cool are added. So, there really is not a benefit to the eggs being pre-warmed themselves. Think of the actual embryo, all it knows is that it's temperature is gradually increasing which increases cellular growth and development. There is an incubation time period of 21 days or 504 hours (this can vary several hours for different breeds or strains) so pre-warming counts as development. If some eggs pre-warm longer than others they may hatch at slightly different times. So, How pre-warming happens is not important as long as the pre-warming occurs for all eggs to be set uniformly.