Do YOU reccomend Dry Hatching?

[FuzzyOwlFeet]

Pretty much what the title says. In the past 3 sets of eggs I've noticed the eggs that failed to hatch during lockdown drowned, too much humidity. I'm terrible at adjusting it, so I'm wondering if dry hatching would be more my style? How exactly do you do it?

I'm using an old Farm Innovator 4250. I live in the northeast corner of Nebraska, USA if that matters at all.

Any tips you have would be much appreciated... I'm still a rookie when it comes to hatching eggs.

 

[Smileybans]

I switched to dry hatching after I was having the same issues in my farm innovators incubator. The fan had stopped working in mine so I let the humidity get down to 20%. I never added water and let the humidity in the room do all the work. Increased my shipped egg count by so much. That incubator finally died so I’m actually working with the new digital model of the 4250. I still dry incubating and am letting the humidity get down between 20-30%. The farm innovators incubators don’t hold humidity for very long anyway in my experience.

After the eggs have had their 18 days of dry incubation though I put them into a different incubator that is already set at 60% humidity and 100F. Then I just leave the eggs in the lockdown incubator. The lockdown incubator is small so I try not to open it unless I have to. Then if I have to I put in a wet paper towel.

 

[FuzzyOwlFeet]

I switched to dry hatching after I was having the same issues in my farm innovators incubator. The fan had stopped working in mine so I let the humidity get down to 20%. I never added water and let the humidity in the room do all the work. Increased my shipped egg count by so much. That incubator finally died so I’m actually working with the new digital model of the 4250. I still dry incubating and am letting the humidity get down between 20-30%. The farm innovators incubators don’t hold humidity for very long anyway in my experience.

After the eggs have had their 18 days of dry incubation though I put them into a different incubator that is already set at 60% humidity and 100F. Then I just leave the eggs in the lockdown incubator. The lockdown incubator is small so I try not to open it unless I have to. Then if I have to I put in a wet paper towel.

This is the exact kind of information I was needing. Thank you! It's been sticking to 20-30% by itself so far, it's only been about 30 hours since I set the eggs, but I've been checking them every couple hours. I'll probably wait until day 7 to open it up and check for quitters, does that seem alright?

 

[BantyChooks]

I keep my humidity in the high 20s for incubation and 40 to 45% for hatching. I've found lower lockdown humidity works better for me; my hatches seem faster and they're far cleaner. However, this isn't a suggestion endorsed by many, so YMMV.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

I think you mean dry incubating? I have done this almost from the get go, as my ambient humidity is high. Mine runs between 30-40%, and I have never had problems with "wet" chicks. You can run as low as 20-25%, but I believe you do not want to dip lower than 20%. Your plan sounds good. You will find out if you need adjusting as you go along. Keep an eye on your aircell size. Good luck!

 

[Smileybans]

@BantyChooks I’ll have to give that a try. I hadn’t heard about that and am now thinking my hatch humidity might be too high. My bantam hatches are never good, 50% if that, and my standard hatches are somewhere around 60-70%. Definitely going to give the 40-45% a try though.

@FuzzyOwlFeet you can candle at day 7 but I usually wait until day 10. Buy day 10 you will know for sure who has quit and who hasn’t. I found that at day seven there will be some that are a bit harder too tell. But I’m always candling darker eggs.

 

[BantyChooks]

@BantyChooks I’ll have to give that a try. I hadn’t heard about that and am now thinking my hatch humidity might be too high. My bantam hatches are never good, 50% if that, and my standard hatches are somewhere around 60-70%. Definitely going to give the 40-45% a try though.

@FuzzyOwlFeet you can candle at day 7 but I usually wait until day 10. Buy day 10 you will know for sure who has quit and who hasn’t. I found that at day seven there will be some that are a bit harder too tell. But I’m always candling darker eggs.

60%+ is definitely standard. My theory is that when you start off at a higher humidity, things are wetter/damper than they would be with a lower humidity, which causes sharp decreases to be more damaging because the wet "goo" tends to harden when dehydrated, causing stuck chicks. That's merely an idea, however, and all I have is tenuous anecdotal evidence rather than actual experiments (which I should run sometime.) If you're having good luck with your lockdown results, I would be quite cautious about changing your methods. If you're having a lot of lockdown quitters, however, maybe it would be worth exploring. Sanitation made the most difference in my hatch rates IMO.

 

[Smileybans]

@BantyChooks I wondered if going from such a low incubation humidity to a high hatch humidity would mess with the chicks. To me it makes sense. But I’m not an expert by any means. I will give it a try.

I make sure to bleach and wash my incubators in between hatches. Is the bleach okay to use or should I be using something else? I have two lockdown incubators and use one while I clean the other then vise versa after a hatch. How do I clean out the fan parts? That’s the only parts I haven’t been able to clean.

 

[MadamContrary]

I did my first dry hatch and had my first 100% hatch rate. So I'm sold on it's superiority. As I understand it you should not let your humidity drop below 30%. Dry hatching is also not for every climate, what is your ambient humidity? I live on the coast with a minimum humidity of 80% so my incubator (NurtureRight 360) has only dropped below 30% on one occasion, it's currently running at 51%. For the last 3 days I brought it up to 60% and it rose to 74% as the first two chicks hatched. It was a VERY clean hatch, I was very surprised at the difference there, there was no "egg smell" either throughout the whole incubation.

 

[BantyChooks]

@BantyChooks I wondered if going from such a low incubation humidity to a high hatch humidity would mess with the chicks. To me it makes sense. But I’m not an expert by any means. I will give it a try.

I make sure to bleach and wash my incubators in between hatches. Is the bleach okay to use or should I be using something else? I have two lockdown incubators and use one while I clean the other then vise versa after a hatch. How do I clean out the fan parts? That’s the only parts I haven’t been able to clean.

Bleach is good, yes. For me, it was implementing sanitation measures with staggered hatches and washing my hands before I candled.