Drowning Chicks I need some Advice…

[ZeiaZeia]

This is my first time hatching eggs. I read everything I could on your site. I bought 48 eggs shipped from GreenFireFarms. 12 were infertile. I candled at day 7&14. Removed the early deaths. 23 drowned (I opened all to check) 12 hatched correctly, 1 would have hatched with assistance but turned around blocked the hole and I believed suffocated. I ran the RCom 50 pro incubator at 100.0*F and even though I set it to 30% humidity it stays at 45%-55%. I did have the one vent open. At day 20 I increased the humidity to 70%. I didn’t increase at day 18 because I wanted to avoid drowning. The eggs were set in cut down cartons not laying horizontally in the turner. My question is this…. If I put the incubator at 101-102*F will the next clutch of eggs lose enough water to not drown? I do not know why my incubator cannot decrease the humidity to 30 % is it because I have the vent open? Thank you for your help! All advice welcome!

 

[BirdsBeesTrees]

No don't raise the heat.
If you know that the incubator is running 15-25% higher humidity than when you went to lockdown you actually raised the humidity to 85-95%.
Shipped eggs are always more "watery", so stay on the low end of humidity when incubating and hatching. I incubate at 30-35% and hatch never more than 60-65%.
RComs are great incubators. Still, if I'd never hatched before I wouldn't start with a bunch of the most expensive eggs I could find. Hindsight is 20/20 though.

 

[casportpony]

What humidity does your RCOM run at with no water in it?

 

[CanadaEh]

I do not know why my incubator cannot decrease the humidity to 30 % is it because I have the vent open?

If you somewhere where it is still summer and warm, even running the incubator dry will still cause the humidity inside to be relatively high. The only thing you can do is to run dehumidifier or air conditioner in the room to low the humidity.

however you should not worry that much about sticking to the humidity guidelines, but rather monitor the air cell growth against what is recommended by candling your eggs every few days. What I do is I run the incubator dry and only add water before lockdown for hatching or when proper size air cell has developed.

 

[ZeiaZeia]

What humidity does your RCOM run at with no water in it?

45-55% dry

 

[ZeiaZeia]

What humidity does your RCOM run at with no water in it?

45-55%

 

[BirdsBeesTrees]

45-55% dry

As CanandaEh said you should run a dehumidifier or air conditioner to get extra humidity out of the air in the incubator room.

 

[casportpony]

45-55% dry

Wow, that's high. Do you have another sensor that you can put inside to verify that your RCOM's sensor is accurate?

 

[CanadaEh]

23 drowned (I opened all to check)

I don't think chick can drown due to high humidity during hatching, but because trying to internally peep at the wrong side of the egg where there is no air cell (assuming there is proper size air cell). I increase humidity to (at least) 65 for hatching, but it shoots to 90 after the first chick is hatched (due incubator fan blowing through wet feathers)

 

[ZeiaZeia]

No don't raise the heat.
If you know that the incubator is running 15-25% higher humidity than when you went to lockdown you actually raised the humidity to 85-95%.
Shipped eggs are always more "watery", so stay on the low end of humidity when incubating and hatching. I incubate at 30-35% and hatch never more than 60-65%.
RComs are great incubators. Still, if I'd never hatched before I wouldn't start with a bunch of the most expensive eggs I could find. Hindsight is 20/20 though.

Wow, that's high. Do you have another sensor that you can put inside to verify that your RCOM's sensor is accurate?

I am in Florida the humidity stays at almost 100% all the time