First Attempt at Incubating Underway - UPDATE - Operation: Booties

[kathyinmo]

Oh this is so much fun for me. I hope you are having fun too.

I will keep watching for updates!

Best wishes and good luck!

 

[Whitehouse Quail]

So exciting!

 

[dianneS]

Please keep us posted!

 

[kathyinmo]

I do hope to hear a progress report! How's it going?

Good hatching vibes comin' your way!

 

[mischievouschickens]

So we put all the eggs in lockdown yesterday.

I was so nervous picking up each egg off the egg turner and carefully placing them into the "hatching egg carton". I even managed to slip twice and have the eggs "thud" against the carton. I hope they were OK in there. Talk about butterfingers.

Unfortunately, we couldn't put the shelf liner as planned. Instead, I figured I would use a big 2 dozen egg carton and leave the top on (but opened) as padding for the chicks when they arrive.

I cut a hole in the top so that I could still put warm water into the bator without opening it up.

Managed to get the bator up to about 62% humidity. Unfortunately, in so doing I got the thermometer probe wet and the temp readings were off for some time (they dropped like a rock!). I had to pull the probe out and dry it quickly and put it back in. I think temps drop typically in "moist" air anyway, at least that's what I noticed. Later in the evening, the humidity dropped to 60% so I put in more water. Finally got it to 65% and steady so I went to bed. Around 3 AM, I got up to check the bator and temps had indeed fallen to below 101 so I turned up the thermostat a tad. The humidity also dropped to about 60%. Poured more water in and got it back to 65%. OK, all good.

Pretty smooth so far. It is now the end of Day 1 in lockdown. As I walked by the bator I heard a familiar *peep peep* that I hadn't heard in some time. I thought to myself, we don't have any chicks.... They're all grown up now. That's when I looked close at the bator. We got peeping for the first time.

So now, the wait continues. In the meantime, I will post some pictures of our set up. Enjoy!

 

[silkiechicken]

Best of luck! After adding water and such, give the bator at least 3 hours to get to temp before changing any settings as it will need to equalize again.

 

[kathyinmo]

Quote:
Oh yes, pictures! Peep, peep .... I hear grandchickies! Come on babies!
Isn't that just the neatest thing to hear!

 

[evonne]

i'm late coming in.. that's typical of me... i blame my A.D.D. .... lol...

anyway... make sure when you add water for the humidity that you're adding warm water.. close to the temp in the bator as you can.. so just warm to the touch... will help keep the temp from droping...

isn't that chirping from the eggs the wierdest thing???
mine was this slow start and at first i wasn't sure that's what i was hearing.. it was early.. i'm not usua;;y up.. but for some reason i got up with hubby at 5 am and was moping around trying to decide about going back to bed... it started about 10 minutes after he left.. yeah.. couldn't sleep after that...

good luck.. hope everything is going well....

 

[Freckle Face Farm]

chirping is my most favorite sound that means the babies are coming

Good luck sounds GREAT for a first hatch!

 

[mischievouschickens]

I had some problems getting images off my camera last night. Sorry for the delay in getting up these pictures. So here are the eggs in their new digs as we put them into lockdown.

You can see the 2 dozen eggs foam carton takes up much of the space in the bator. I'm not sure how much more mesh I would have covered with the shelf liner anyway so hopefully all is well there. When they come out

there should be ample room to roam about. On the left hand side, you can see the cutout I made to allow access to the water channels without opening the bator. In retrospect, I should have made at least two cutouts so I would have access to the other channels as well. As it turns out, to up the humidity I ended up pouring water through the cutout and also on the other side of the carton top ("over the wall above" so to speak) so there was some water that just pooled on the surface there. That helped a lot and got the humidity to 65% pretty quickly.

Here's a top view of the set up and you can see the eggs nicely. I think I "thumped" the rightmost egg on the top row (the second egg I placed) so hopefully it's OK. There was another thump as well but now I cannot remember which egg it was.

At the top you can see the cheapie hygrometer I got from Petco. I calibrated it first and reads high about 2%. Throughout Days 1-18, the humidity ranged between 35% - 42%. The rightmost egg on the bottom row has a "ring" around what appears to be the air cell. I did not notice this when I took the picture but only later as I was looking for the peeping culprit. I was a little worried because it kind of looks like leaching salt deposits (know what I mean?).

Here is my literal window into the chickies' world for the next 3 days with thermometer probe in.

Here is a picture of the top of the bator. When we borrowed it, it was missing one of the vent covers so we decided to use tape as a makeshift solution. You can make out some condensation on it - must be pretty humid in there! I simply remove the tape and insert the straw/funnel through the vent just above my cutout to add water from time to time. There's also enough room to swivel the straw around to position the water elsewhere in the bator, like over on the top half of the carton cover. My thermometer probe used to go through that same vent hole until I got it all wet - really messes up the readings!

Since I've moved it, doing OK.

Here you can see the humidity is just about at 60%. I add 1/4 cup of warm water at a time which boosts the reading to about 65%. Generally speaking, it stays there for only a short while and reaches equilibrium again at 60%. I think this has to do with the fact that I did not put water in the other channels of the bator. Alas, we live and learn. 60% may be good enough and I may decide to stop "disturbing" the system any further - regardless of how minor it may be.