Bought All The Things. How Does This Help Hatch Rate? Frustrated & Overwhelmed

[Bicoastal]

Before my next round of hatching guineas in my first season, I followed advice and bought the Govee, a gram scale, a penlight flashlight, a remote read-out thermometer... even bought a second Nurture Right 360. It took me 1.5 hours to candle eggs on Day 10 with weighing, tracing air cells, and recording information in a notebook and on the eggs.

How does all of this data help my hatch rate? I candled each egg before incubation and saw no hairline cracks. Set 43 eggs. Tossed six on Day 10.

I weighed them before incubation and weighed them on Day 10. I have the Govee in Bator #2. It is averaging 43% humidity. Most eggs in Bator #2 lost 2 grams. Guineas take 28 days. So what do I do with all of this data?

Ignorance is bliss! Tracing air cells and feeling excited was way more fun and less stressful.

[To answer any homework questions: I tested Govee's temp and humidity. Then I ran each bator empty to determine baseline temp and humidity and adjusted set temp accordingly (minus one degree).]

 

[U_Stormcrow]

I can't speak to most of that - but proper candling and removal of infertiles means your chicks in progess aren't sharing space with potential bacteria bombs. THAT will improve your hatch rate.

 

[FunClucks]

Before my next round of hatching guineas in my first season, I followed advice and bought the Govee, a gram scale, a penlight flashlight, a remote read-out thermometer... even bought a second Nurture Right 360. It took me 1.5 hours to candle eggs on Day 10 with weighing, tracing air cells, and recording information in a notebook and on the eggs.

How does all of this data help my hatch rate? I candled each egg before incubation and saw no hairline cracks. Set 43 eggs. Tossed six on Day 10.

I weighed them before incubation and weighed them on Day 10. I have the Govee in Bator #2. It is averaging 43% humidity. Most eggs in Bator #2 lost 2 grams. Guineas take 28 days. So what do I do with all of this data?

Ignorance is bliss! Tracing air cells and feeling excited was way more fun and less stressful.

[To answer any homework questions: I tested Govee's temp and humidity. Then I ran each bator empty to determine baseline temp and humidity and adjusted set temp accordingly (minus one degree).]

Take the total weight you expect your eggs to lose before lockdown. [For chickens, this is 11-13% of initial egg weight lost by Day 18. I know chickens, but the concept is the same for guineas, so I'll give chicken numbers and you can apply to guineas] Divide this initial egg weight by the number of days the eggs have to lose the weight. Then multiply by the number of days since you initially weighed them/started incubation. This total is the weight loss you should see per egg on Day X.

An example: Initial egg weight 65g. Total weight loss target = 7.15 to 8.45 g (aka 11-13% weight loss by Day 18 which is lockdown for chickens). Let's say we pick a target weight loss of 12%, which = 7.8g. Your daily weight decrease target is 7.8grams / 18 days = 0.433 grams per day, which is basically impossible to measure without a really excellent and expensive scale. So what we do is pick 2 or 3 days to measure and check the combined weight loss. For instance, weight loss at Day 10 should be 4.33 grams. So your 65gram starting weight egg should weigh 60.67 grams on Day 10. If it does, you're on track for losing the correct amount of moisture and shouldn't change a thing. If the weight loss is low (egg weighs more than 60.67g), you can decrease humidity in the incubator in order to speed up the weight loss. Weigh again in about 5 days to see if that fixed things. If the weight loss is higher than 60.67 grams, you would increase humidity in the incubator to slow down weight loss. Either way, you should aim to reach 57.2 grams egg weight on Day 18. On Day 18 (lockdown) change the humidity as required for lockdown, and see how the hatch goes.

How much should you adjust the humidity if you see lower or higher weight loss than expected? This will depend on your incubator and your room conditions, and is trial and error for each setup.

There are a number of Articles on what can go wrong during a hatch, and what defects the deceased chicks display (during eggtopsy) that indicate certain problems with them. I'd strongly recommend you read these if you haven't already - your issues may not be with your incubator.

Good luck!

 

[FunClucks]

Also, I don't know about guineas, but female chickens get off the nest about half an hour each day, so whenever I candle or weigh, I make sure to keep it in that time window. Initial weights can take as long as needed, but after about three days of incubation, need to keep them warm. I would candle and weigh on subsequent days if needed from a time perspective.

 

[Allsfairinloveandbugs]

I'll tell you My truth; my broody hens have hatched hundreds of chicks, and never once have I weighed eggs or traced air cells. I do candle religiously and remove any non-viable eggs on days 7 and 14. I learned my lesson re how important candling is after a rotten egg once exploded under a hen. Never again will I allow that wretched incident to occur!

 

[FunClucks]

I'll tell you My truth; my broody hens have hatched hundreds of chicks, and never once have I weighed eggs or traced air cells. I do candle religiously and remove any non-viable eggs on days 7 and 14. I learned my lesson re how important candling is after a rotten egg once exploded under a hen. Never again will I allow that wretched incident to occur!

I put eggs under a broody for the first time this spring. It was so much easier than incubating them myself! I don't think I even candled them, just waited for them to hatch, but you have a good point. I probably will in the future.

 

[Bicoastal]

Did some research and this article on BYC states guinea eggs need to lose between 11-13% by day 23. I found another article that supported that. So same weight loss as chickens, but I need to calculate it out by five more days. Math intimidates me.

Let's say egg weighs 40 grams and we are aiming for 12% loss. It needs to lose 4.8g over 23 days. Weight loss on Day 10 was 2g. What do I do with that info?

OH! And @FunClucks , when I candle, I replace the lid each time. So the cumulative time for me is 1.5 hours. That's 2 mins per egg out of the 'bator. The NR360 does a pretty good job keeping up temp during candling and 22 lid lifts. It does lose humidity, so I add some water when I'm done.

 

[FunClucks]

So, 4.8g / 23 days = 0.2087 grams per day weight loss targeted. On Day 10 you would expect a weight loss of 0.2087 * 10 = 2.09 grams. Your target weight loss for Day 10 is 2.09 grams. So your 2 gram actual weight loss is right on target. Sounds like your humidity setting is great! I'd just sit tight, keep doing what you're doing, and check again in 10 more days, or in 5 if you prefer.

When I check eggs, I take the lid off the entire incubator and set it to one side, then candle/record weights as much as I can in half an hour. Then I replace the lid. If your method is working for you, and it seems to be, I'd keep doing what you're doing. You have an actual out-time of only 2 minutes per egg per day - I understand why you describe it as a 1.5 hour process, but the actual time your egg is out of the incubator is only 2 minutes, which is awesome! My out-time is 30 minutes per egg per day.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

FunClucks beat me to it, and I was going to engage in some casual rounding, so I will instead write to confirm above is correct!

 

[Bicoastal]

Thank you so much @FunClucks ! You are super duper helpful! And thank you for running the numbers, too, @U_Stormcrow !

So I should candle again on Day 20? And that would leave me enough time to adjust humidity if needed? Article says 11-13% weight loss to day 23. My eggs start hatching on day 26 and finish on day 29.

Leaving the lid off would be a lot easier! I need to figure out a recording process and streamline my record keeping. I was juggling a pen and notebook, pencil for the egg, flashlight, shuffling back and forth from incubator to my writing surface. Writing stuff down in a notebook, writing the same thing on the egg. It was ridiculous.