Dry incubation and lockdown humidity

[JustAChickenLoverOverHere]

I adjusted my still air incubator and tested my two forced air incubators with different calibrated thermometers. Turns out both my forced air ones were reading at 97F. Color me surprised. So I turned up the temp on both and switched out my thermometers. I guess the thermometer I had in there wasn’t calibrated anymore. Hopefully having the new thermometer in there will solve some of my problems and give me a better hatch rate.

How is everything going?

 

[Smileybans]

How is everything going?

I had two more hatch since I upped the incubation temp in my lockdown incubators. I’m hoping the others aren’t dead already.

 

[Portugal Muscovy Novice]

I'm not sure about lockdown humidity but I can tell you what's worked (for me). I'm in Portugal in the Alentejo region (south) and it regularly gets above 30C in summer and humidity is quite low at around 20 - 35% during the day. The nights can be around 80-90%) and I'm not even joking. I'm telling you this because you cant just blindly follow the 40 - 60% rule for incubation and 65 - 70% for hatch. The ambient humidity will vary so much you need to compensate for this somehow.

First of all I highly recommend dry incubating and weighing the eggs on a weekly basis to ensure that they will loose 13 - 15% in the three weeks they are in the 'bator. I've lost quite a few eggs because I was told to keep humidity between 40 and 50%. That DID cause them to not loose enough weight and they drowned as you rightly said earlier. If they are under weight you add humidity and if they are over weight you remove humidity or just don't add water. You have to know your eggs. Some are more porous than others. You can see this for yourself when you candle them. I'm currently doing 15 Orpingtons and the guy I bought the eggs from clearly has issues with feed as they were calcium deprived and extremely porous. (I felt so sorry for the hens). For the first time in my life I had to incubate at 50% humidity from week one almost. They are now pipping and I'm keeping the humidity between 65 and 70% but this is because the shells are already so very brittle due to the porousness I mentioned before. If they were "normal I would hatch at 80%

I'm not brave enough to try dry hatching as I've only seen issues if the humidity drops below 60%. This includes eggs not unzipping, getting stuck in the membrane with me trying to save a poor chick with a tweezer and cotton wool before the membrane gets "baked on". On the flip side if the humidity is above 80% I often get the dreaded yellow goo, of which I don't know the actual scientific cause, but it doesn't happen at lower humidity during hatch. This also requires clean up and care and attention. you will notice that none died, it just means different remedies for healthy chicks. So basically you can't go that much wrong in lockdown in my opinion.

Summary:
1) I dry hatch and add water as needed after they all get weighed.
2) Depending on how much humidity I introduce during incubation, I adjust the humidity level during lockdown / hatch. Less moisture (65 - 70%) for porous eggs and more (<80%) for solid eggs. You'll notice I'm not talking about deaths here as they wont die/drown due to humidity at hatch in my experience, you might just have to give them some love and clean them up.

Hope this helps, what did you find with your last hatch?

 

[Smileybans]

I'm not sure about lockdown humidity but I can tell you what's worked (for me). I'm in Portugal in the Alentejo region (south) and it regularly gets above 30C in summer and humidity is quite low at around 20 - 35% during the day. The nights can be around 80-90%) and I'm not even joking. I'm telling you this because you cant just blindly follow the 40 - 60% rule for incubation and 65 - 70% for hatch. The ambient humidity will vary so much you need to compensate for this somehow.

First of all I highly recommend dry incubating and weighing the eggs on a weekly basis to ensure that they will loose 13 - 15% in the three weeks they are in the 'bator. I've lost quite a few eggs because I was told to keep humidity between 40 and 50%. That DID cause them to not loose enough weight and they drowned as you rightly said earlier. If they are under weight you add humidity and if they are over weight you remove humidity or just don't add water. You have to know your eggs. Some are more porous than others. You can see this for yourself when you candle them. I'm currently doing 15 Orpingtons and the guy I bought the eggs from clearly has issues with feed as they were calcium deprived and extremely porous. (I felt so sorry for the hens). For the first time in my life I had to incubate at 50% humidity from week one almost. They are now pipping and I'm keeping the humidity between 65 and 70% but this is because the shells are already so very brittle due to the porousness I mentioned before. If they were "normal I would hatch at 80%

I'm not brave enough to try dry hatching as I've only seen issues if the humidity drops below 60%. This includes eggs not unzipping, getting stuck in the membrane with me trying to save a poor chick with a tweezer and cotton wool before the membrane gets "baked on". On the flip side if the humidity is above 80% I often get the dreaded yellow goo, of which I don't know the actual scientific cause, but it doesn't happen at lower humidity during hatch. This also requires clean up and care and attention. you will notice that none died, it just means different remedies for healthy chicks. So basically you can't go that much wrong in lockdown in my opinion.

Summary:
1) I dry hatch and add water as needed after they all get weighed.
2) Depending on how much humidity I introduce during incubation, I adjust the humidity level during lockdown / hatch. Less moisture (65 - 70%) for porous eggs and more (<80%) for solid eggs. You'll notice I'm not talking about deaths here as they wont die/drown due to humidity at hatch in my experience, you might just have to give them some love and clean them up.

Hope this helps, what did you find with your last hatch?

This is spot on with most of what I have found. I don’t add any water during incubation. Day 1-18 the humidity sits at 20-30%. Without me adding water.

Days 19-21 the lockdown incubator has its humidity between 30-60%. Depending on the humidity in the room and the look of the air cells before I put the eggs in. Usually if my lockdown incubator is full I have to lessen the humidity. But otherwise I only add a small amount of water to get the humidity up to around 30.

I actually am hatching out eggs now and lost one because I opened the lockdown incubator, to remove chicks. I’m not sure if that was exactly the reason but the chick had pipped, made no progress over 12 hours, and turned in the egg without zipping. When I went to check on it again it was dead. I have been trying not to assist with my hatches but I did assist the other one that had pipped at the same time as the dead one. Because I had opened the incubator the membrane was stuck to the chick. But besides the one I lost the others have been popping out of their shells no problems. One minute there’s no chicks then I go to look and there’s two more. Five chicks hatched out with the humidity sitting at 32%. When I assisted the other chick I added a wet paper towel to the incubator which spiked my humidity to 80%. This may pose a problem with my other I hatched chicks but I won’t know until later.

 

[Portugal Muscovy Novice]

This is spot on with most of what I have found. I don’t add any water during incubation. Day 1-18 the humidity sits at 20-30%. Without me adding water.

Days 19-21 the lockdown incubator has its humidity between 30-60%. Depending on the humidity in the room and the look of the air cells before I put the eggs in. Usually if my lockdown incubator is full I have to lessen the humidity. But otherwise I only add a small amount of water to get the humidity up to around 30.

I actually am hatching out eggs now and lost one because I opened the lockdown incubator, to remove chicks. I’m not sure if that was exactly the reason but the chick had pipped, made no progress over 12 hours, and turned in the egg without zipping. When I went to check on it again it was dead. I have been trying not to assist with my hatches but I did assist the other one that had pipped at the same time as the dead one. Because I had opened the incubator the membrane was stuck to the chick. But besides the one I lost the others have been popping out of their shells no problems. One minute there’s no chicks then I go to look and there’s two more. Five chicks hatched out with the humidity sitting at 32%. When I assisted the other chick I added a wet paper towel to the incubator which spiked my humidity to 80%. This may pose a problem with my other I hatched chicks but I won’t know until later.

My hatch completed yesterday and I'm so sad. I had a technical issue which meant I had to open the incubator for 5 minutes and I had shrink wrapped chicks. Of 10 only 5 survived. I'm gutted and could just cry. I'm not sure if the drop in humidity caused it but they were shrink wrapped regardless. It wouldn't be such a drama if they were my own chickens but I bought fertilized Orpington eggs as mentioned before and they were quite expensive here in Portugal. We will try again ofcourse! I also have to learn to leave them the £$%^ alone as im a bit of a meddler!

 

[Smileybans]

My hatch completed yesterday and I'm so sad. I had a technical issue which meant I had to open the incubator for 5 minutes and I had shrink wrapped chicks. Of 10 only 5 survived. I'm gutted and could just cry. I'm not sure if the drop in humidity caused it but they were shrink wrapped regardless. It wouldn't be such a drama if they were my own chickens but I bought fertilized Orpington eggs as mentioned before and they were quite expensive here in Portugal. We will try again ofcourse! I also have to learn to leave them the £$%^ alone as im a bit of a meddler!

I’m a meddler too. I can’t stand to watch chicks die and if I think I could have done something I will try to help the others. So far the other eggs have hatched out alright even though I’ve had to open the incubator. I have 7 left in this set and I hope they go as well as the others.

The chick I helped out of its egg I am leaving in the incubator for now. Which means opening the lockdown incubator more than I like. But because I helped it it’s legs are not as strong as they should be. It also has some membrane stuck to its feathers. Until I have a special area set up for it it stays in the incubator. The wet paper towel I put in the incubator is keeping the humidity from dropping too low. I just hope it’s enough to not kill off the rest of my eggs. I don’t know how mother hens do it. Incubators are so finicky at lockdown but mother hens can, they usually dont, get up and leave the nest. Even during the last three days.

 

[Portugal Muscovy Novice]

I’m a meddler too. I can’t stand to watch chicks die and if I think I could have done something I will try to help the others. So far the other eggs have hatched out alright even though I’ve had to open the incubator. I have 7 left in this set and I hope they go as well as the others.

The chick I helped out of its egg I am leaving in the incubator for now. Which means opening the lockdown incubator more than I like. But because I helped it it’s legs are not as strong as they should be. It also has some membrane stuck to its feathers. Until I have a special area set up for it it stays in the incubator. The wet paper towel I put in the incubator is keeping the humidity from dropping too low. I just hope it’s enough to not kill off the rest of my eggs. I don’t know how mother hens do it. Incubators are so finicky at lockdown but mother hens can, they usually dont, get up and leave the nest. Even during the last three days.

right?! I mean hens don't have water bottles or wet bulbs or any of this stuff. Can you imagine a hen with a mister to increase the humidity in the coop? The reason I got the Orpingtons in the first place was because they get very broody and can take this responsibility away from me. Hopefully I will only have to do one more batch of my Farmyard mix which is such an easy breed to hatch. literally switch on the incubator, put them on the incubator floor on day 18 and out they march on day 21, but they get good food and are very happy little chickens...they just don't brood!

 

[Smileybans]

right?! I mean hens don't have water bottles or wet bulbs or any of this stuff. Can you imagine a hen with a mister to increase the humidity in the coop? The reason I got the Orpingtons in the first place was because they get very broody and can take this responsibility away from me. Hopefully I will only have to do one more batch of my Farmyard mix which is such an easy breed to hatch. literally switch on the incubator, put them on the incubator floor on day 18 and out they march on day 21, but they get good food and are very happy little chickens...they just don't brood!

I can imagine that. A hen holding a spray bottle and misting around her. It sounds like something straight out of a cartoon.
I got silkies to do the same thing. All three of my silkie hens went broody at once and so did one of my OEs. The silkies did great. The OE abandoned her chicks not even two weeks later. Actually one of the silkies adopted the abandoned chicks. The OE I won’t let brood again. One of my silkies has just now started to kick out one of her chicks actually. This chick is probably 6 weeks old. So the hen let the baby stick around longer than usual I guess.
No one is broody now otherwise I would have some egg from this set under them. I only want to keep a rooster from this set and get rid of the rest. So I don’t want to integrate them all into my flock just to rehome/sell them later.