Help me with my school project! (Incubator vs broody hen)

[Cloverr39]

I have a school project in biology about hatching chiks. I'm looking for some information on these topics. The topics are:

1. Hatching chicks with an incubator
2. Hatching chicks under a broody hen
3. Comparing the two methods

I would love some basic info as well as pros and cons of both. It's a little hard to find information when only searching for articles or websites. I thought I might try asking here to find some clearer info. In the comparison maybe I should compare hatch rates, cost, etc.?
Thank you!!

 

[DobieLover]

If we're talking about biology (the study of living organisms), it seems only logical to use as close to a natural incubation as possible. The broody hen will win every time for me.
I don't see any cons to using a broody hen other than the chance she will be a bad mother. It happened once to me but I had a back up rock solid broody that adopted her chicks when her own hatched. Failing that, you would brood them yourself as you would if you hatched using an incubator.
The cons I see with incubators are errors in machine setup/calibration, power outages, accidents handling the eggs or other malfunctions during incubation.

 

[ManedWolf]

I have never used an incubator, but I plan to use one for the first time this spring. The problems I've run into with broody hens is typically crushing or rejection. I've learned I have specific hens who are too old to sit on eggs/mother anymore since they are excessively heavy and have arthritis preventing them from being as nimble and gentle. As for the rejection part, you just have to keep an eye on the mother and chicks for the first few days. After a few days it's smooth sailing! Plus mother hens teach chicks things that people can't (how to chicken basically).

 

[Ridgerunner]

It sounds like a great science project but it can get complicated because there are so many variables either with an incubator or with a broody hen. You will have some decisions to make.

There are many different makes and models of incubators available. They can handle different numbers of eggs. Some are still air and some are forced air. Warm air rises. A forced air incubator has a fan which distributes the air so the temperature is supposed to be the same throughout. In a still (or thermal) air incubator the temperature can vary be elevation, it will be warmer up higher, so where you take the temperature inside is important. How they manage humidity levels varies from one to another. Some come with automatic turners but with some you have to turn the eggs by hand. In some you stand the eggs on end with the pointy side down, in others you lay them flat.

To go into details of how to manage the incubator you'd have to know the specific incubator. It is really helpful if you have the instructions that come with it. Some of the things you need to manage are that you need to start all the eggs you want to hatch at the same time so they hatch at the same time. The eggs should be turned regularly. Temperature needs to remain steady. It really helps to have a calibrated thermometer to confirm your temperature is correct. The incubator needs to be in a location where the temperature is pretty stable, out of direct sunlight which can heat it up, and out of any wind, whether from open doors to the outside or from AC and heating vents.

The eggs need to lose a certain amount of moisture through the porous shell. Unfortunately different humidities inside the incubator work best for different people. Part of that is due to the differences between different incubators and part of it is due to where the incubator is sitting. The temperature and moisture levels of the air going into the incubator have an effect. Height above sea level can have an effect. At least in Latvia you don't have to worry about high elevations. Some people do best with a 30% humidity level inside the incubator, others do better with the level 50% or over. My suggestion to you is to try the level that your incubator manufacturer recommends. That means you need a calibrated hygrometer or use the wet/dry bulb method.

After 18 days of incubation you should do what we call lockdown. Stop turning the eggs and, if you can, remove any automatic turners. Increase the humidity to assist the eggs in hatching. There can be debate on exactly what you need to do but I suggest somewhere in the 65% range. It should increase as the chicks hatch and release more moisture inside the incubator. I don't worry about how high it goes as long as it stays above 65%.

The initial problem with hatching with a broody hen is getting a broody hen. They don't all go broody and you cannot control when one actually goes broody. It is often not when you want them to. That is one limitation in hatching with a broody hen. Another limitation is that you are limited to how many eggs a broody hen can cover and hatch. Eggs and hens come in different sizes. A small bantam hen may have trouble covering four large fowl eggs while a large fowl hen can cover a lot of bantam eggs. I typically give a hen about 12 eggs of the size she lays but I had one that could only cover 10 of those. I've also had a hen hide a nest and bring 18 chicks off. I never found that nest so I don't know how many eggs she started with or if all the chicks were from eggs she laid. You can buy incubators that hatch a handful of eggs up to commercial incubators that can handle 60,000.

When you get a broody hen you can let her hatch with the flock or you can isolate her. If you let her incubate with the flock you need to mark the eggs you want her to hatch (I use a black Sharpie) and check under her each day after the other hens have laid and remove any that don't belong. Other hens sometimes lay in the broody's nest and some broodies move other eggs into their nest. If you don't remove them they can start to develop but will never hatch because they are too late. Also, if enough eggs collect that she cannot cover all of them some can get pushed out from under her and die. You usually don't get good hatches if the eggs pile up too much.

If you let her hatch with the flock she should occasionally leave the nest for food, water, and to take a poop. Maybe take a dust bath. But most of her time will be on the nest. The nest is open to the rest of the flock. Depending on whether you free range or keep them in a tightly controlled run they may be available to nature. I had a snake eat the eggs out from under a broody hen once. Things can happen.

If you isolate the hen you need to build a shelter so she can be locked up in there until the hatch is over and the other chickens cannot enter. You need enough room for food, water, and for her to poop. Things can happen here too. One risk is that she will break from being broody. Most of the other things that can happen can also happen if the hen is incubating with the flock.

For conclusions to be valid, they have to be repeatable. Unfortunately whether you use a broody hen or an incubator you often do not get consistent results, even if you try to do things exactly the same. There are just too many variables during incubation or with the quality of the eggs you start with. I've had really good hatches and really bad hatches with both broody hens and with my incubator. To get valid results you would need a lot of incubations with both methods, trying to be as consistent as possible.

Still, I think this could be a fun science project. The type of things I'd think you could measure is how many eggs start to develop and how many hatch. You could open the unhatched eggs and try to determine if they ever started to develop or at what stage they died. And keep track of how much time you spend in each method. Keeping track of costs can sometimes yield interesting results.

Good luck. And if you have specific questions, just ask.