Hi Everybody
After starting a thread on incubation of Dewlap Toulouse it appears that some people (myself included) are finding it hard to achieve an adequate moisture loss from their eggs and this is resulting in dead in shell
From the literature and drawing on peoples experiences it appears that daily cooling of the egg from Day 4 to lockdown appears to increase hatchability and moisture loss. Certainly I have found this to be the case with my own eggs. The only theory I can think of is that as the egg rapidly loses heat to the cooler environment then this process also allows for a sudden increase in the loss of water molecules also. As warm air can carry more moisture Im assuming the egg is giving up heat and water at a rapid rate to the cooler (and lower humidity) air in the environment. Where I have read that cooling stimulates the embryo then this process also allows for increased gas exchange also and is beneficial to the developing chick.
Everybody's opinions and experiences would be very very welcome as this may help to resolve many cases of dead in shell. Come on folks lets get our experiences shared and see if we can use this forum to help improve hatch rates of our goslings
Pete
After starting a thread on incubation of Dewlap Toulouse it appears that some people (myself included) are finding it hard to achieve an adequate moisture loss from their eggs and this is resulting in dead in shell

From the literature and drawing on peoples experiences it appears that daily cooling of the egg from Day 4 to lockdown appears to increase hatchability and moisture loss. Certainly I have found this to be the case with my own eggs. The only theory I can think of is that as the egg rapidly loses heat to the cooler environment then this process also allows for a sudden increase in the loss of water molecules also. As warm air can carry more moisture Im assuming the egg is giving up heat and water at a rapid rate to the cooler (and lower humidity) air in the environment. Where I have read that cooling stimulates the embryo then this process also allows for increased gas exchange also and is beneficial to the developing chick.
Everybody's opinions and experiences would be very very welcome as this may help to resolve many cases of dead in shell. Come on folks lets get our experiences shared and see if we can use this forum to help improve hatch rates of our goslings

Pete
