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Hatching for Easter?

winterwolf4

Songster
Feb 17, 2023
309
714
196
Oregon
Hi,
I want to hatch for Easter. I will be hatching Aracauna X Easter Egger crosses.

I wanted to know what advice I can get for hatching. I am getting the Nurture Right 360 to hatch with since we have not had good incubators in the past.
Do I need to clean it when it comes out of the box? I now know that I need to clean in between hatches. What other advice can you give me? What does the humidity need to be? This will be a new and better incubator for us. Before we have been using the Jumbl incubator and an old Styrofoam one that spiked to 104 degrees.

When my husband uses the incubator he doesn't really do much he puts the eggs in, adds a little water here and there, and checks on it twice a day. He didn't even clean it between hatches. He didn't know what he was doing. He just thought he could put eggs in and they would hatch. We have gotten about 15 to 20 chicks that have lived in the past 8 months that we have been doing this though. :)

I know there has to be more of a science to hatching. Since I will be doing the monitoring this round I want to do it by the book.
 
Hi,
I want to hatch for Easter. I will be hatching Aracauna X Easter Egger crosses.

I wanted to know what advice I can get for hatching. I am getting the Nurture Right 360 to hatch with since we have not had good incubators in the past.
Do I need to clean it when it comes out of the box? I now know that I need to clean in between hatches. What other advice can you give me? What does the humidity need to be? This will be a new and better incubator for us. Before we have been using the Jumbl incubator and an old Styrofoam one that spiked to 104 degrees.

When my husband uses the incubator he doesn't really do much he puts the eggs in, adds a little water here and there, and checks on it twice a day. He didn't even clean it between hatches. He didn't know what he was doing. He just thought he could put eggs in and they would hatch. We have gotten about 15 to 20 chicks that have lived in the past 8 months that we have been doing this though. :)

I know there has to be more of a science to hatching. Since I will be doing the monitoring this round I want to do it by the book.
It’s up to you whether you clean it when it comes out the box, I can’t imagine it being too harmful if you didn’t clean it, but probably better if you do.
Make sure you have a your own separate hygrometer in the incubator, as the reading the incubators ‘built-in’ one has isn’t always 100% accurate.
Humidity is a difficult one as it varies for many different people in different climates, usually after using an incubator a few times you can work out what humidity works best for that specific incubator. Obviously it’s hard on the first hatch in that incubator as you wouldn’t know yet. I like to aim for around 40-45% as that’s what’s always had the highest hatch rate for me. Even around 35% isn’t too bad. A lot of people do around 50-55% but I’ve always found that a little too high myself.
every few days you can candle the eggs, and the air cells will be a good indicator if you have too much/too little humidity in there.
If you search ‘egg air cells chart’ (or something similar) you’ll find pictures which show how big the air cells should be each day of the incubation period.
The ‘ideal’ temperature for hatching is around 100F (99.5F to be precise), it’s never to much of a worry if it goes up by a couple or down by a couple, but should there be an incident where the incubator malfunctions I always think it’s better for the temperature to drop a little rather than be raised too much.

Good luck for hatching 👍🙂
 
If you are up for a long read there is a thread here that is something along the lines of Harris Farms Nurture Right 360 is Amazing!!!!! It has sooooo much information! (I can try to find the thread as well and link it here)

Most find with the NR360 it is good to incubate around 45% and lockdown around 65%. You definitely want a separate hygrometer/thermometer that you can calibrate. My temp is way off on the incubator. You should hatch at 99.5 on average. Since the NR30 rotates the eggs as it turns them you will have hot and cold spots in the incubator which is fine since all eggs will hit all the spots so don't freak if the thermometer shows low or a bit high in certain spots. depending on the temp in the room (colder now being winter and was warmer in the summer) I need to keep my temp on my NR360 at 100 - 101 for it to read 99.5 in there. keep the vent fully open the whole time. Also start with only about 1/4C of water in side A and give it a couple hours to see how humidity is, you want to set it up and have it running about a day before so you can adjust things and it is warmed up. If you put too much water in side A it overflows into side B so you won't notice that it is full by the fill section. most days I only need to add about 1/8C of water to keep humidity up. You may have to add more or less but easier to start low and add a TINY bit at a time to bump it up than it is to wait to get it back down. Again the humidity will be on average so don't worry if it drops or goes a bit higher. Mine will bounce and may get down to 30 overnight but when I first add it it may be 50 for a bit but it will all average out.

Any other questions feel free to ask. Also if you go to the hatch-a-long page there is an Easter one that you can join in as well. They are fun and you can get a lot of information there as well.
 
If you are up for a long read there is a thread here that is something along the lines of Harris Farms Nurture Right 360 is Amazing!!!!! It has sooooo much information! (I can try to find the thread as well and link it here)

Most find with the NR360 it is good to incubate around 45% and lockdown around 65%. You definitely want a separate hygrometer/thermometer that you can calibrate. My temp is way off on the incubator. You should hatch at 99.5 on average. Since the NR30 rotates the eggs as it turns them you will have hot and cold spots in the incubator which is fine since all eggs will hit all the spots so don't freak if the thermometer shows low or a bit high in certain spots. depending on the temp in the room (colder now being winter and was warmer in the summer) I need to keep my temp on my NR360 at 100 - 101 for it to read 99.5 in there. keep the vent fully open the whole time. Also start with only about 1/4C of water in side A and give it a couple hours to see how humidity is, you want to set it up and have it running about a day before so you can adjust things and it is warmed up. If you put too much water in side A it overflows into side B so you won't notice that it is full by the fill section. most days I only need to add about 1/8C of water to keep humidity up. You may have to add more or less but easier to start low and add a TINY bit at a time to bump it up than it is to wait to get it back down. Again the humidity will be on average so don't worry if it drops or goes a bit higher. Mine will bounce and may get down to 30 overnight but when I first add it it may be 50 for a bit but it will all average out.

Any other questions feel free to ask. Also if you go to the hatch-a-long page there is an Easter one that you can join in as well. They are fun and you can get a lot of information there as well.
Overall would you recommend the Nuture Right 360?
 

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