First hatch! Tips?

chipens

Songster
6 Years
Sep 4, 2017
266
254
168
new zealand
First time hatching quail eggs!
Any help or tips for a successful hatch?!
Im day 11 so getting close! Candled day six and looked like all was well.
Temps been pretty consistent at 37.5°c trying to keep humidity around 50/60% but my incubators a bit temperamental with weather here atm. Hope it doesn't effect them too much .
When I lockdown chicken eggs i put a lil non slip matt thingy i made with ridges to stop them rolling round etc, would that be good for the quail too ? Or should I not use it, or would a plain non slip matt be Ok?
Also best day for lock down? Am thinking day 14.
Thanks for any help/Tips!
 
Your humidity is a little on the high side for incubation. I prefer to have my humidity in the 35 to 45% Rh range. The last 3 days of incubation I raise the humidity to 65 - 70% Rh. I don't like the term "lockdown" as this time is just a period of time in the incubation process. Day 14 would be ok to increase the humidity. Don't open the incubator until all eggs are through hatching. If you absolutely have to open it, make sure none have pipped or are in the process of zipping. Quail chicks can go 24 hrs. with out feed or water. Don't panic if they don't hatch all at the same time. Some may hatch early, some late, so a couple of days past the intended hatch date may still have chicks hatching...depends on the temperature during incubation. Lower than 99.5°F will take longer, 100 to 101°F will result in early hatches. Good Luck with your hatch!:jumpy HTH
 
I second much of what @007Sean said.

Your humidity is higher than I like it. I shoot for 40% and am happy anywhere from 35% to 45%. During incubation, the air sac needs to get bigger. For that to happen, the egg needs to dry out a little (but not too much). The humidity controls that. Less humidity, more drying; more humidity, less drying.

People have hatched quail eggs with similar humidity to what you have, so there's no need to panic. But I would decrease it for the next few days if I were you. (At this point, I'd shoot for the mid-30s.)

Your temperature is right on.

Yes, lockdown is at 14 days, but that's at the end of 14 days. Not at the beginning of the 14th day. Normally, I don't think it would be much of a problem to go into lockdown a day early, but since I think your humidity has been a little high up to this point, I wouldn't start the high-humidity lockdown early if I were you.
 
Thanks! I was a lil worried about the humidity, i top it up in the morning and itl go up to like 70% then itl drop, sometimes by the next morning its down at 13%! So its quite hard to keep it steady, seems to be our summer i think because during winter i was hatching chickens and didn't have much of a problem.
Im thinking I might candle again to check air pockets? See if they're ok.
 
Soon, I'm going to candle the eggs tonight its day 12 what should the air sacks be like?
I just candled and about 20 out of 23 eggs show life, from shipped eggs. And air cells looked okish not too big not too small.
My eggs are in a automatic turner should I take them out of that end of day 14? But maybe up humidity bit later?
Also I have a brooder heat plate thing, will the quail be ok under that? Ive not used one before, usually put my chickens in a brooder made from a plastic tub with a normal 60watt light bulb (wide angle) at one end.
 
You should take them out of the turner, yes. I'd up the humidity at the end of day 14, as people sometimes get early hatches at day 15 and you don't want those to get stuck in the egg.
I've never incubated anything myself, but I've read a few threads on this forum where people have been using heat plates for quail, and apparently they struggle getting warm enough for quail - several posters have had quail chicks dying on that account. So you might be better of using the light bulb.
 

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