Hatching at high altitude

[Little Coop on Salt Creek]

Best of luck.... just remember hatching can be addictive lol

Ha! Yep, just like chickens and chicks ... and just like that I’m now known as the resident crazy chicken lady to my family and friends! ..

 

[Peep_Show]

The best math is chicken math!

 

[Little Coop on Salt Creek]

Thanks everyone! We set another batch on Thursday and are hoping for a better outcome. Red vent plugs are out! Working on keeping the humidity lower & at this point a damp paper towel is working better than the sponge. The humidity pads are ordered too. I also scoured over @Pyxis incubation article so am hopeful we’ll have a better turnout this go round.

We started this hatch out in our Farm Innovators incubator while waiting for our new Incuview with humudikit to arrive next week.

I wanted to update everyone on our hatch using the Incuview with Humidikit. We finished our hatch this last week and had a 69% hatch rate. That was up from the 25% we were getting from the Farm Innovators incubator. We are super happy with that. The humidikit ended up having a leaking problem that Incubator Warehouse is fixing for us. Once that piece arrives, we are going to set another batch of Silkies and Silkie/EE mixes. Super excited to see if our numbers can get even better this time. I was also super happy to see that the practical tips picked up from @Pyxis incubation article worked! I am now kinda addicted to weighing my eggs to adjust my humidity, LOL.

 

[SillyMissLily]

So I could only read a few pages of this thread, not all of it, but I am still sitting here wondering "where are the other high-elevation breeders?" I can't have roos or I would be offering up fertile eggs myself. Is there an easy way to find eggs at mile plus elevations? I did find one or two on ebay, but that took some time, and they didn't have breeds I really wanted.

I have also just decided to pay more to get live chicks and forget even trying to hatch. For all the time and money invested with eggs, just buying the babies seems the way to go.

 

[R2elk]

So I could only read a few pages of this thread, not all of it, but I am still sitting here wondering "where are the other high-elevation breeders?" I can't have roos or I would be offering up fertile eggs myself. Is there an easy way to find eggs at mile plus elevations? I did find one or two on ebay, but that took some time, and they didn't have breeds I really wanted.

I have also just decided to pay more to get live chicks and forget even trying to hatch. For all the time and money invested with eggs, just buying the babies seems the way to go.

It usually comes out cheaper in the long run to buy live chicks than to hatch eggs unless the eggs are free.

You may want to check out the Colorado threads in the Where am I? Where are you! forum. I know that at one time they had a group that would haul eggs to other Colorado members.

 

[aliciaplus3]

So I could only read a few pages of this thread, not all of it, but I am still sitting here wondering "where are the other high-elevation breeders?" I can't have roos or I would be offering up fertile eggs myself. Is there an easy way to find eggs at mile plus elevations? I did find one or two on ebay, but that took some time, and they didn't have breeds I really wanted.

I have also just decided to pay more to get live chicks and forget even trying to hatch. For all the time and money invested with eggs, just buying the babies seems the way to go.

If you are not allowed roosters then yes it is cheaper to buy live chicks, I hatch because I Love it! And I have my own flock to hatch from, so not too expensive. I can also breed to what I want in a flock, right now we are working on a necked neck flock of every color. I may have some decent Delaware in the future, selective breeding from hatchery stock so I feel pretty good about the results. I am on the western slope of Colorado.

 

[Hermits Garden]

I highly recommend reading Hatching Eggs 101.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/hatching-eggs-101

The amount of humidity required is dependent on the amount of weight loss of the eggs. Too high of humidity will cause the air cells to not increase sufficiently during the incubation period. The need for the eggs to lose weight to get to the proper size air cell by lock down is the same no matter what elevation the eggs are hatched at. The need for a higher humidity at lock down is not to get the eggs to absorb water but to prevent the egg lining from drying out once the shell has been externally pipped.

The most common cause of shrink wrapping is from people opening the incubator while there are externally pipped eggs in the incubator.

There are problems hatching eggs shipped from lower elevations to higher elevations. There are far more problems simply because the eggs were shipped. Some varieties of eggs simply do not ship well. Very fresh eggs will yield much better results than older eggs.

I am located at approximately 1 mile above sea level. The best success that I had on shipped eggs was 75% success on Maran eggs shipped from a much lower elevation in Arkansas. I also had a 60% hatch from Welsummer eggs shipped in the same package. The difference in the success rates was that some of the Welsummer eggs were more than a couple of days older than the Maran eggs.

I get excellent hatches from my own eggs and what I consider reasonable (50% or higher) hatches from well packaged fresh eggs (1 to 2 days old) shipped eggs that have not had their air cells destroyed by the USPS.

What works for me is 20 -30% humidity prior to lock down and 60% humidity during lock down. The absolute most critical thing for me is to make sure all vents are fully open during the final week of incubation. It is absolutely a no no to close down a vent hole in order to increase the humidity. In my very dry house (less than 10% humidity), 60% humidity is the maximum that I can get for lock down. At the higher elevations the higher that you drive the humidity, the less oxygen will be available to hatching eggs.

These levels of humidity work for me but just because something works for me does not mean it will work for you. I do know my actual humidity levels and must caution that from what I have learned that there are not any reasonably priced digital hygrometers that are accurate throughout the entire humidity range. It is very easy to check the hygrometer at 75% humidity but that does not prove that the hygrometer will be accurate in the range that I incubate at.

Good luck everyone.

Awesome information--thank you. I'm at 7130 ft (or will be, once the house is finished and the coop built), and dry like where you are. I'll be hatching eggs from my flock once it is established, and not likely to ship eggs, so this is excellent news.

 

[Lynda720]

I'm sorry, I posted in the wrong site. I posted before in buy and sell. My question was has anyone had trouble hatching eggs in higher altitudes. I've heard that the shells from lower altitude are different than from higher. I'm in the foothills of Colorado I believe at 7800 ft. I'm new at this also.

I purchased fertile eggs here in Colorado you can find them online. I got 12 eggs one was not fertile but the rest were. I only had 1 die. I live near Fort Morgan. This was my first time doing it. I also have Duck eggs from my ducks I am trying to hatch. I will see how that goes. https://www.serenitysprouts.com/product-page/eggs this is where I got them.

 

[Kahunaman]

We run a small operation hatching Bresse chicken eggs on our ranch up above Deckers. We are at 8,500 feet. When we first bought our Bresse breeders, the eggs came from farms in South Caroline - low altitude. We hatched 12 out of two dozen. Our next eggs came from our own hens. We typically get an 80% or better hatch rate for those. Conclusion: altitude does make a difference. If you want good success, get eggs from a high altitude hatchery.

 

[Micmac1234]

I have 8 eggs under a broody hen and I’m worried none are going to hatch. We’re on day 22. I got my eggs from Washington and I’m wondering if they’re duds because of the altitude… does anyone here in Colorado sell fertilized eggs?