dropping temp for hatch

[SpunkyTheMonkey]

straw poll: how many people actually bother dropping temp to 98.5 for hatch?

 

[Akane]

Why would you drop temp? I've never read that anywhere or heard of anyone doing it. Sometimes my chicks still like it at 100F for awhile when I move them to the brooder.

 

[SpunkyTheMonkey]

Quote:
because you're supposed to

http://gallus.tamu.edu/Extension publications/b6092.pdf check out the table on pg 6. everything listed except emu, ostrich and rhea hatch at lower temp than they incubate, although for a lot of birds it's only 0.5 difference, and for chickens it's 1 degree.

i ask because when i built our bator (just finished, not hatched anything yet) i forgot about the temp drop for hatch and put the t-stat inside so i'm not tempted to fiddle with it once it's stable (it has a probe so the knob could go outside) and now i'm wondering how much it matters. if most people are getting good hatch rates without dropping temp i'll be less inclined to worry about it.

 

[Akane]

Maybe if you were hatching in a very fancy incubator with tons of eggs and a medical grade thermometer while trying to get exact results for a study or similar. The actual temp you can incubate eggs ranges from 98 to 102 with some people even going outside of that. A still air should be run at 101-102 and a forced air 99-100 on average. However then there's the fact most people don't have extremely accurate thermometers so they are probably off by as much as a degree and occasionally a few degrees. By the time you get done with all the variables there's no reason to lower the temp for 99% of the people hatching and probably not even for commercial hatcheries. Eggs will still incubate and hatch in a range of temps. Just adjust the temp based on when they hatch. If they go a little early lower it and if they go a little late raise it. Attempts to change a temp that's working fine may just throw your incubator off and kill everything when it seems completely unnecessary. That's the first thing I've seen that says you should change the temp for hatching.