How do you maintain humidity in the incubator?

[KaylorFarms]

Hello all,
I've hatched eggs before in the past, but ended up with a rather unsuccessful hatch rate which I think was probably due to the fact that I couldn't maintain humidity in the incubator. Even if I put the tiniest amount of water in, my humidity would spark up to the 60's in the first days of incubating, which I thought you had to keep the humidity close to 50 before lockdown. Anyway, in the middle of the night my humidity would go down to the 30's, and I think that's why I ended up with a lot of duds. So my question is, is there a way to maintain humidity for long periods of time? Or is the incubator just not good? Thank you all in advance!

 

[Shamo Hybrid]

Well.... what kind of incubator do you have?

 

[Bantamgirl715]

I have nothing but cheap-as-can-be incubators, neither of which I even bothered to calibrate when they arrived, but I still have good hatch rates. Mine are small (9-12 eggs) and for the first 18 days I add just 25 ml water once a day. Starting day 18 I add 25 ml twice a day. Temp is set to 37.6 Celcius for the first 14 days, 37.5 days 14-20, and 37.4 for hatch time.
Forced air for no hot spots is critical to success too, I feel. And many people overlook how stable the temperature is in the room they incubate in.

 

[CindyinSD]

I’m new to incubating, but I’ll share what I’ve learned so far; some from experience and some from others’ advice. I have a tabletop incubator, forced air.

My humidity does the same thing. I have three concentric rings for water. I fill the center one as much as I can without overflowing into the middle one. I do this because the spike you can create in your humidity depends on the surface area of your water, not on the actual amount of water. The more distal rings obviously have a greater surface area available for evaporation whereby to elevate your humidity. If you fill an outer ring even a little bit, you’ll see a spike in your humidity until that water evaporates. The rings in mine have a slightly depressed overflow, so I can’t fill them all the way up or they’ll overflow (bad unless I need that second ring).

If your humidity is too high even though you use only the smallest reservoir, you could put a wet sponge or slice of a sponge and increase the number/surface area of wet sponge until you reach your target humidity. This may also help you to keep a consistent nighttime humidity.

I’ve been filling my middle ring before bed and then again in the morning. I’m incubating duck eggs, so 55-60% is my target until lockdown (according to Holderread). It’s 99% humidity outside but 30% inside because our high temp today is 35 Fahrenheit and as our heater is broken, we’re running the gas fireplace. I have the incubator in its shipping box with the flaps taped in their upright position. This helps keep the temp stable and maybe the humidity as well? Don’t know; can’t hurt, I guess.

I don’t think short-term spikes or reductions of humidity will matter in the long term. The goal is to accommodate the proper rate of dehydration in the eggs. As long as you don’t have long-term elevated humidity or arid conditions, you shouldn’t worry too much. Obviously you’d love to keep that number within limits. Real world conditions and budget equipment don’t always make that possible. Just do the best you can.

 

[Bantamgirl715]

More and more people are having good success with dry incubation too, where you add absolutely no water until lockdown. Humidity in my house is very low so I always add a little.

 

[KaylorFarms]

Thank you all so much for your replies! So is the humidity being too high, or too low not really a big issue?

 

[Bantamgirl715]

A lot of people will swear humidity is THE most important factor in hatching eggs. I don't even use a hygrometer; for the first 18 days there should be no condensation on the inside of the bator windows; for the last 2-3 days, there should be a little. Once the first egg hatches humidity skyrockets and stays high anyway.

 

[CindyinSD]

It matters... but you need to remember that the environment inside the egg can’t spike or drop nearly as fast as the environment inside the incubator (but outside/surrounding the egg.) So if your incubator goes up to 70% for an hour or so before you notice and correct it (by soaking it up with a sponge or paper towel), that’s not gonna kill your eggs. If you leave it like that all day, then I’d be worried.

Lots of folks ignore the humidity and swear that works great. I think the success of “incubating dry” probably says more about your home’s ambient humidity than about the needs of the eggs, but it does highlight the fact that your precision level can be approximate and you’ll still likely get as good a result as if you had fussed and fussed.

 

[Shamo Hybrid]

Thank you all so much for your replies! So is the humidity being too high, or too low not really a big issue?

I was able to successfully hatch almost 100% of my eggs with only a humidity of 40% from start to finish.

 

[CindyinSD]

My Incuvue hygrometer recommends 35-55%, so that seems reasonable to me. It’s a lot easier to maintain than the 55-60% recommended for duck eggs.