Hatchers

[pfmoore17]

I like the idea of a hatcher so you can stagger your egg hatches in the incubator.

A friend has offered me a still air bator, very basic. Is it necessary to install a fan? The bator is locked down for the final countdown. Just wondering. thanks

 

[onthespot]

I use a still air styrofoam incubator for a hatcher. I stagger hatches all over the place like a drunk! It is better if you keep the hatch dates more than four days apart, allowing for an extended hatch due to temps being off, time to clean and air out the hatcher and let it air out and dry completely before the next batch needs to be laid down for a few days, so yeah, actually a week in between hatch dates would be good. I find the eggs close to the sides, and especially in the corner can be a LOT cooler/colder than the rest of the heated area. The ones idrectly under the element get too hot, so I rotate them from the outside/corners, to the middle and let the middle just make room for them.

 

[pfmoore17]

you make a good point about the cleanliness of using a hatcher.

what temperature/humidity did you use in your still air unit. I know with a fan it's 99.5F, but still air is 101.5F?

thanks

 

[onthespot]

I use this model of digital hygrometer/thermometer, but I paid a LOT less at walmart. http://cgi.ebay.com/DIGITAL-HYGROME...mQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item35a6741a2bI think they were eight or ten dollars there. Anyhow, if I lay it on top of the eggs, I shoot for around 101, 102-ish. If I lay it on the wire same level as the eggs, I look for 99. If I have not enough eggs to lay it on and stay up there, I sometimes lay a section of hardware cloth on top of the eggs and put it on top of that, and shoot for 102. I know that is a lot of different readings, but more important than an exact temp in a still air is keeping those eggs rotated from the cool areas to the warm areas. I junked (well, they are still here and there, but not using them) the plastic egg turners and have had MUCH better luck with rolling my hand over the tops of the eggs to turn them in a random way, and I can feel the eggs and pull the cooler ones to the center. I make sure I wash and dry my hands really well before I do it. If I was being really picky I would probably wear disposable latex gloves, but I am kind of haphazard how I do things. Good luck in your efforts. Feel free to PM me or post on the board for help any time.

Oops, forgot to address humidity. Because I have a lot of dark eggs, olive eggers, marans, stuff like that, I tend to run my humidity around 35, sometimes down to 20, sometimes up to 50. But I try to be around 35-40% most of the time, then over 50, less than 70 the last three days. Again, I know those are some pretty wide parameters. For me it is all about averages over time rather than finding some magic number and clinging to it like grim death. I have no way of finding that magic number, and could not hang on for grim death because I am just not equipped to capture a single reading. I check the eggs several times a day. They are in my linen clothset, so I try to check when I am walking down the hallway. If I had my incubator somewhere out of the line of foot traffic, I would never hatch anything. I know everything I am saying is against most conventional wisdom here, but I get a lot of chicks to hatch, not all, but plenty enough to keep me in the game, of varieties considered rare or difficult to hatch. I have had very bad results with the one time I tried sebastopol goose eggs, but mostly otherwise I have done okay with the above way of doing it. There are a thousand ways to arrive at a given point, just find the one that works for you. Too hot is worse than too cool, too wet is worse than too dry the first 18 days.