Help with hatching guinea

[Pamalamawitt]

My son decided to work towards hatching is own guinea eggs. We are supporting him but he has been doing all of research so I am here for any suggestions/help.

He has a still air incubator and is manually turning. They are in a dark room. The temp. is about 100. The humidity hung at about 45%. His first two eggs went in on 4/27 and lockdown 5/26. We candled on 5/25 and it was definitely live. We are struggling to get the humidity up and have no signs of hatching. I have spritzed and put warm water in the channels.

At this point what do I do with the ones that went on lockdown 5/26. How long it too long and they will not do anything? What can I do to improve his hatch chances?

 

[R2elk]

My son decided to work towards hatching is own guinea eggs. We are supporting him but he has been doing all of research so I am here for any suggestions/help.

He has a still air incubator and is manually turning. They are in a dark room. The temp. is about 100. The humidity hung at about 45%. His first two eggs went in on 4/27 and lockdown 5/26. We candled on 5/25 and it was definitely live. We are struggling to get the humidity up and have no signs of hatching. I have spritzed and put warm water in the channels.

At this point what do I do with the ones that went on lockdown 5/26. How long it too long and they will not do anything? What can I do to improve his hatch chances?

The optimum temperature for a still air incubator is 100.5°F to 101.5°F measured even with the top of the eggs. Do not be surprised if the keets hatch late due to running the incubator a little on the cool side for a still air incubator.

Do not spritz the eggs as the cooling effect from the water evaporating from the egg surface will cause the egg to cool down.

The way to increase the humidity in an incubator is to increase the surface area of the water. Increasing the depth of the water will not increase the humidity. You can increase the surface area by adding a porous sponge, wash cloth, etc. with one end of it in the water source.

When candling, if the egg is internally pipped, it will likely pip in about 24 hours.

 

[Pamalamawitt]

R2Elk thank you! I am doing the wash cloth now. I double checked the temp and it is seems the temperature reading on the incubator was actually lower then it read. I have put another thermometer in there to try to increase the temperature too.

I am not seeing the eggs move. At this point should I do anything else? Float? Candle; I am not sure when I looked if they had internally pipped since this is our first attempt at this. Or just wait?

The optimum temperature for a still air incubator is 100.5°F to 101.5°F measured even with the top of the eggs. Do not be surprised if the keets hatch late due to running the incubator a little on the cool side for a still air incubator.

Do not spritz the eggs as the cooling effect from the water evaporating from the egg surface will cause the egg to cool down.

The way to increase the humidity in an incubator is to increase the surface area of the water. Increasing the depth of the water will not increase the humidity. You can increase the surface area by adding a porous sponge, wash cloth, etc. with one end of it in the water source.

When candling, if the egg is internally pipped, it will likely pip in about 24 hours.

The optimum temperature for a still air incubator is 100.5°F to 101.5°F measured even with the top of the eggs. Do not be surprised if the keets hatch late due to running the incubator a little on the cool side for a still air incubator.

Do not spritz the eggs as the cooling effect from the water evaporating from the egg surface will cause the egg to cool down.

The way to increase the humidity in an incubator is to increase the surface area of the water. Increasing the depth of the water will not increase the humidity. You can increase the surface area by adding a porous sponge, wash cloth, etc. with one end of it in the water source.

When candling, if the egg is internally pipped, it will likely pip in about 24 hours.

 

[R2elk]

R2Elk thank you! I am doing the wash cloth now. I double checked the temp and it is seems the temperature reading on the incubator was actually lower then it read. I have put another thermometer in there to try to increase the temperature too.

I am not seeing the eggs move. At this point should I do anything else? Float? Candle; I am not sure when I looked if they had internally pipped since this is our first attempt at this. Or just wait?

If your temperature was even lower than you thought it was, the hatch should definitely be delayed. You can try candling again. Do a search for pics of candled egg, perhaps include the term draw down and or internal pip. It pretty much looks the same whether it is a chicken egg or guinea egg.

Or, you can just wait patiently because it is going to happen when it happens.

 

[Pamalamawitt]

The first couple in the batch did not make it. I am pretty sure it is because of the humidity. I have gotten the humidity up to 61% and working to try to increase it more. Here is my question:

He only has one incubator and manually turns. What is a happy medium to allow keets to successfully hatch while not doing harm to the developing embryos?

If your temperature was even lower than you thought it was, the hatch should definitely be delayed. You can try candling again. Do a search for pics of candled egg, perhaps include the term draw down and or internal pip. It pretty much looks the same whether it is a chicken egg or guinea egg.

Or, you can just wait patiently because it is going to happen when it happens.

 

[R2elk]

The first couple in the batch did not make it. I am pretty sure it is because of the humidity. I have gotten the humidity up to 61% and working to try to increase it more. Here is my question:

He only has one incubator and manually turns. What is a happy medium to allow keets to successfully hatch while not doing harm to the developing embryos?

If you have candled and can see that all of the eggs are far along in the incubation process, you can go ahead and go to lockdown conditions. Eggs can hatch fine if not turned during the last week to 10 days because the chick is moving enough on its own by then.

I have had keets hatch in the incubator under incubation settings with the turner going without any problems. Obviously the higher humidity for lockdown would have been better but is not absolutely necessary. These hatched early because they were rescued eggs that had already been partially incubated. Once a few started hatching, I put the remaining eggs in the hatcher with the higher humidity.

Good luck.