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Villagechicken - will try to answr best I can for you, I'm not an expert but this is what I've learned during my hatches.
1. once you set the eggs in the bator don't open it to turn the eggs back! the rocking around from the first ones to hatch actually helps the others to get moving along. I always to try think, 'what would mama hen do?' she's not going to roll them back to where they were, plus the air cell line is only a good guess on where they will pip...very often it's right on the mark but I've had tons that have hatched differently (been tracing since last fall). don't worry, they will be fine if they get rocked around. IF you are super worried about that you can always put them in an egg carton to hatch. that works well keeping them from moving around.
2. you will read tons and tons on humidity and so many posts your head will spin! I know for me 65% is good. THat's what I try to aim for. It WILL go up when they start to hatch, in fact if i notice humidity went up a couple degrees during hatch that usually means another egg has pipped. I've hatched out several groups of BCM and they seem to be good with that. Although, I know folks in a higher altitude tend to keep their humidity higher. IMHO, i'd go with 65%.
3. humidity should be higher during lockdown so that the membrane inside the shell, the one the chick has to first break through, needs to be moist and soft so the chick can hatch. Also, after they pip, that membrane will start to dry out, if the humidity is too low, it will get stuck to the chick (shrink wrap). on the flip side, if it's too high, when they internally pip (break into the air cell) there will be too much liquid and the chick will drown. I know that I've had a couple hatches where my humidity was 90% as they were hatching and it did not seem to effect them, but it had been at 65% prior to everyone hatching. The hen doesn't increase the humidity per se (she doesn't sweat, etc) but will not leave the nest so it remains more constant under the eggs.
One suggestion in case you do need to add water, I use some tubing for aquariums and tape a small funnel to one end, put the other end into one of the openings in the top (where you have taken the red plugs out of) and position it so the tube is in one of the channels. I usually just put in a little at a time. Also, if you have a syringe that will fit on the tube that works even better than the funnel (had DH bring me one home from work).
as for my BBS eggs, I noticed yesterday that I was mistaken with my split Lav eggs, looks like i do have ONE that's good! woohoo! only a few more days till lockdown!
I would also be interested to hear from someone who has delt with loosening stuck eggs! I have a egg stuck in the turner that must have gotten egg white on it when 2 eggs broke during shipment!
