How long before I give up on hatching eggs?

[McSpin]

If you heard a peep, don't bother candling. Peeps are an even better indicator.

The time to candle is at about 10 days. Developing chicks are obvious and rejects can be removed. From this group, most everything will hatch if conditions are correct. Sounds like your temps are too low. Live chicks should have hatched by now if the temp was correct. You may have a bad thermometer or two.

 

[HEChicken]

this time I WILL NOT ADD ANY MORE WATER .. I will try and see what happens.

Are you talking about not adding water once you are in lockdown? That worries me a little because it is during lockdown and actual hatch, that the chick needs the highest humidity. Too low a humidity at this stage can lead to the chick getting shrink wrapped and not making it out of the shell at all.

 

[Kansas Gal]

Well, I had a total of 2 of 16 eggs hatch. I do wonder about the thermometer, and am getting another thermometer and wafer before I try to hatch again, which will be quite awhile, and will use my own eggs (once I get a roo of age!) Just a major disappointment, not to mention all that money down the drain! Sheesh! At least these two little guys appear healthy, and are eating and drinking, so that is good! I am also going to learn candling before the next hatch I ever do!

 

[McSpin]

Well, I had a total of 2 of 16 eggs hatch. I do wonder about the thermometer, and am getting another thermometer and wafer before I try to hatch again, which will be quite awhile, and will use my own eggs (once I get a roo of age!) Just a major disappointment, not to mention all that money down the drain!

This is why most beginners are better off buying chicks. It takes practice to get egg hatching down to the point where the percentage is over 50%. People think it's cheaper - it's not.

 

[melodym78]

No surprise for me ! I think I fail again waaaa ! But will keep them in till after weds. to be safe. Both times I tried to hatch (Dec and now ) they seems to died during lockdown. Temps is 99 and humidity is around 71% I left them alone during lockdown. I have 3 more eggs in another incubator, they are due Feb 7th. If I failed again it will be my last time. I am very sad !!

dont give up....been there! so what i did was hatch my own eggs for awhile. Most times it was the mailed eggs that I had trouble with. My eggs hatched liked crazy, especially my silkie eggs. Now keep in mind most of the eggs I bought were from reputable breeders so it has nothing to do with the breeders. Its the mailing of the eggs. So dont be too discouraged. We have all been there...NOTE: most of the eggs I had a zero hatch rate on were the most expensive ones!

OUCH!
I found that I had too much temp variations between thermometers. One would say 98 the other was at 102...Making me NUTS!

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I use the fish thermometer and a digital meat thermometer too..I dont concentrate on the humidity until lockdown. So now I do dry incubation and only crank up the humidity at lockdown. I tend to fiddle with my eggs too much..so that way I leave them alone...
Just know that we have all been thru this and it will get better..you will have good hatches and bad, but you will never know if ya give up..There is a wealth of good info on this site..

 

[mandelyn]

A long time ago when I first got into egg hatching, I bought a Hovabator 1402, no turner, no fan, no nothing. Set it up, threw some of my own eggs in, everything I set hatched. That went on for 3 years. Then I got out of poultry for a time, sold everything, incubator included. Was surfing through Ebay a couple years later, and saw hatching eggs. Hatching eggs for sale from all over the country! Cool! I bought 75 quail eggs and the same type of incubator I had before, full well expecting the same results I had from my own eggs. I got 60 of 75. Not bad! Then tried ducks, 5 of 11. I thought that was terrible. Fell out of the hobby again while my husband took us all over the planet for the Army. Started up again a year ago.

Most of my small flock now came from shipped eggs. I can't imagine the let down and frustration beginners have with it if they've never hatched their own eggs first. I came into shipped eggs with experience, a lot of hatches under my belt. A LOT... I don't think my incubator was ever turned off for a year and a half straight. 100% hatch rate was normal for me.

Now with my shipped egg experience, I expect 3 babies from every dozen set. I reserve it for only the breeds I just cannot find locally from a trusted seller. I have Serama eggs setting now, 6 of 10 are fertile and started. If all 6 hatch it will be my best shipped egg ratio ever. I will just be tickled!

If my first hatching experience had been with shipped eggs... I likely would have given it up. But since I can get eggs to hatch... and I know it isn't my fault every time a hatch fails... I keep at it. I KNOW I can do it, it's the shipping process that is so hard on them.

Once I had shipped eggs AND a faulty thermometer. They hatched on day 28! Day 23 we gave up. I decided to use the opportunity to teach husband how to gently open an egg. Good thing! That baby was alive! We put it back quickly and waited.... and waited.... and waited some more till I heard peeps at day 27 and had chicks day 28. Just 3, but still! The one we were going to break got shrink wrapped and I had to help it, but it survived to be my friendliest Splash Marans hen.

 

[thebanthams]

this is what confused me ! Both times they have died during lock down. My temps has been 99, and humidty was 71% , I lost them all. I just dont understand !! (yes they were alive on the 18th day.... I have little giant still air incubator.

Are you talking about not adding water once you are in lockdown? That worries me a little because it is during lockdown and actual hatch, that the chick needs the highest humidity. Too low a humidity at this stage can lead to the chick getting shrink wrapped and not making it out of the shell at all.

 

[HEChicken]

this is what confused me ! Both times they have died during lock down. My temps has been 99, and humidty was 71% , I lost them all. I just dont understand !! (yes they were alive on the 18th day.... I have little giant still air incubator.

Have you calibrated your thermometer and hygrometer? They can be wildly - and I mean wildly - wrong. At one point I had 5 thermometers and every one of them read differently, with more than 5 degrees difference from highest to lowest. How can you know which one to trust in that situation? Many people suggest just taking an average but to me, that isn't satisfactory since the "average" might mean I am in fact incubating at too high or low a temperature. Once I was able to figure out which thermometer was actually reading correctly, I pitched the rest and just use the one.

The first time I calibrated my hygrometer, it was perfect. A month later when I was setting up to incubate another batch, I almost didn't calibrate it, since it was so spot on the first time. This time it was off by quite a bit. My point is, that if your hygrometer is reading 71% but isn't calibrated, your humidity could be as low as 56% or as high as 86% and you wouldn't know it.

I'm not clear on at what point your humidity was 71% but if it was running that high during the first 18 days, it is quite possible the chicks drowned. What happens is that too much fluid builds up between the shell and the inner membrane, when the humidity is too high. When the chick internally pips (breaking through the inner membrane), it is met by a gush of fluid that drowns it, therefore it never even gets a chance to pip the external shell. I would recommend keeping the humidity between 30-40% during incubation (which in some climates is what it will read during "dry" incubation) and increase to 60-70% at lockdown.

Last, as others have said, shipped eggs are a real challenge to incubate. When I first built my incubator, I didn't want to take the risk of trying it out on expensive eggs, so I posted on Craigslist to find some fertile eggs locally. At that point I didn't care about breed - I just wanted to see how well or otherwise, my home-built might work. That way, by removing one variable (shipping), I could focus on the other variables. Is that an option for you?

 

[HEChicken]

I have little giant still air incubator.

I just caught this....I hate to be the one to tell you but the LG has a pretty bad rap around here. I've never tried one so have no personal experience but you are certainly not alone in finding it a challenge to hatch with.

If you are using a still air incubator, 99 is really too low a temp. With circulated air you are looking for a temp of about 99.5, and with still air you want to be closer to 101.

Another BYC member, ChooksChick has written a great "cheat sheet" for hatching using a LG incubator. Here is the link: https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/incubation-cheat-sheet

I would really recommend reading it through all the way and try her technique. As I understand it, she has had a lot of success with LG using this method. Good luck!

 

[thebanthams]

Great ! I will follow this and give it a try. also I went to the store bought me three different kinds of thermometors. (Tell me I am crazy !! ) But I am learning and trying to learn different ways. As of yesterday I set 12 more eggs (I said I wasnt going to do it ! ) Due date 21st. I Hope I can do better !!.

I just caught this....I hate to be the one to tell you but the LG has a pretty bad rap around here. I've never tried one so have no personal experience but you are certainly not alone in finding it a challenge to hatch with.

If you are using a still air incubator, 99 is really too low a temp. With circulated air you are looking for a temp of about 99.5, and with still air you want to be closer to 101.

Another BYC member, ChooksChick has written a great "cheat sheet" for hatching using a LG incubator. Here is the link: https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/incubation-cheat-sheet

I would really recommend reading it through all the way and try her technique. As I understand it, she has had a lot of success with LG using this method. Good luck!