First staggered hatch! Help!

[peepblessed]

I am starting my first staggered hatch tomorrow and I have an automatic turner in my hobart incubator. Do I need to turn it off when the first half goes into lock down or is it made to be safe for chicks?

 

[CarolJ]

How many days apart are the two sets of eggs?

 

[stephanie1992]

stagared hatches are not good if u only have one bator. i learned that the hard way. hArd way. 100% fail. eggs in lockdown need to have the humidity higher. highering the humidity can drown the other eggs if there far behind. in the eggs are close in dates then u can take the turner out and put them all in lockdown. but if it dont work. id invest in a cheap incubator to use as a hatcher

 

[peepblessed]

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My first set will be 10 days when the second batch goes in.

 

[CarolJ]

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My first set will be 10 days when the second batch goes in.

I can't help then. I had a staggered hatch with only three days difference. So I split the difference and started lock down for them all at the same time - First set started lock down 1 day late (day 19 for them) - second set started lock down 1 day early (day 17 for them). I had a great hatch with lots of babies. Ten days difference wouldn't work with that scenario, though. I think a second incubator might be pricey - but, if there's any way you could swing it, would be better than losing all the chicks. Or maybe see if someone near you has an incubator you could borrow.

 

[Ridgerunner]

They are not "made" to be safe for chicks because they are not made for those circumstances. That does not mean that the chicks will absolutely be hurt, just that they might.

Is it the type of turner that you can take out some of the rows? My hovabator 1588 turner has 6 rows of 7 each. I can take out as many rows as I want.

Can you put up a boundary, maybe a wire screen between the sets of eggs so the hatching chicks cannot get to the eggs still in the turner? Maybe build a wire box and put it over the eggs not in the turner?

A staggered hatch is not always a disaster but it is certainly not a good thing. I wish you luck!

 

[CarolJ]

You could take the turner out and manually turn the eggs each day. Then get the brooder set up - and as soon as each chick hatches and dries off and gets fluffy - open it just long enough (mere seconds) to remove the chick and place it in the brooder. I had chicks hatching from Saturday through Thursday - and that's what I did. The temp never varied more than 2 degrees. The humidity will be tricky, though. I send lots of good luck vibes your way!

 

[Gypsy07]

I've done a few staggered hatches and had reasonably good success with them. Obviously it depends on your incubator but the way I do it is to take all the eggs out of the turner for the 'older' eggs' lockdown (the design of the turners in my bator doesn't let you take some out and leave some in) then open the bator three times a day to turn the 'younger' eggs. To counteract opening the bator, I keep my humidity higher than I'd normally have it during lockdown (up past 75%) and my first lot of eggs usually have pretty much the same hatch rate (85-90%) as I'd expect with a normal hatch. After the first lot hatch and I take them out of the bator, I drop my humidity way lower than normal for the next few days to compensate for the high humidity the 'younger' eggs have been exposed to. I get a lot more full term DIS chicks than I'd normally expect but still manage to hatch 5o-60% from the second lot of eggs...

 

[peepblessed]

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Yes, That is the kind I have and that is what I've been planning to do... Thanks.

 

[peepblessed]

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This makes a lot of sense. Thanks!