hummidity

[jen1234]

How do I lower the humidity in my incubator? Tt is always at 70 and its already on the 8th day of incubation. Can someone help me please and thank you.

 

[chicmom]

What kind of incubator do you have? Some incubators have a very small hole you can open and close if it gets too humid.

Also, the surface of the water will help determine how much humidity you will have. So if you have to fill up the little water sections in the bottom of your incubator, and your humidity is too high, then leave one of the water sections empty, but keep the others full and see if that helps.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

70% RH is far too high for incubation. Take all the water out and run dry until day 18 then bring RH back up to 70% for hatch.

The other problem is what are you using for hygrometer and have you calibrated it? A salt test is extremely easy to do and will provide you with accurate readings after. The numbers need to mean something and if never calibrated mean little. The problem with salt tests is your hygrometer needs to be small enough to fit in plastic zip seal bag, gallon bag works but if your unit is incorporated with the incubator then it wont fit. I suppose a salt environment could be made inside the incubator but then again you've already started your incubation and need to get the water out of it ASAP. Walmart sells Acurite hygrometers for around $7 and those work well, small enough to toss in a zip seal sandwich bag with cap full of saturated salt to calibrate.

 

[jen1234]

I have the Pro- Series Incubator I bought it at tractor supply and it has the hydrometer on it. The incubator has 3 slots to put water in them. I fill it up every other day with warm water.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

I have the Pro- Series Incubator I bought it at tractor supply and it has the hydrometer on it. The incubator has 3 slots to put water in them. I fill it up every other day with warm water.

Unless you live in AZ or other very arid climate your likely using too much water during incubation. Here in the New England I use a double shot glass to coffee cup of water to obtain 30% RH during incubation. That is very little surface area of water, how humidity is derived is base line humidity and the surface area of water added to that. Needing as much surface area of the troughs in bottom of incubator would be starting with dessert climate. Again, an incubator with built in hygrometer is very suspect and readings should not be trusted until calibrated. I've seen hygrometers off as much as 15% RH and am sure they ca be eve further off. Without calibration the readings mean nothing. Too much humidity during incubation results in a tiny to no air cell in egg for hatch time. This will result in chicks drowning as they position themselves for external pip- this time would be the internal pip but if no air cell you can't really say that...

 

[jen1234]

So am I still able to calibrate the hydrometer even though i already started my incubation? It will not harm if i take out all the water and just let it go with out water and then later add water when the humidity has to go to 70%? I actually live in New Jersey and weather here is not very arid. I also candled an egg and i could see it forming already.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

If you have a small hygrometer, can pick up a cheap one at walmart for $7, toss it into a zip seal bag with cap full of saturated salt for at least 4 hours and 6 is better. The amount the hygrometer is off from 75 is it's calibration. Say it reads 84 in 6 hours then 75-84= -9. You'd always subtract 9 from your readings for true RH. That's a salt test in a nutshell. Add drops of water to salt until saturated, I pour off standing water. Easy.

Running an incubator without water is done all the time. In fact if you candle and find your air cells are not developing day 10- 14 then the only way to get them back on track is to run the incubator without water until day 18. Common practice really. I've found that with a calibrated hygrometer and running 30% RH I don't need to adjust anything. The air cells are right on track or close enough there is no worry. Looking at the attached diagram for air cells I rarely get them as large as shown day 18 but if they are at least larger than what is shown for day 14 on day 18 you'll be fine. It's not exacting but the important thing is to know there is plenty of air for the chick to breath when it internally pips. Your hatch rate is optimum if the egg loses 13% mass. That can be monitored "close enough" by the air cell size alone. I candle day 10 and again sometime before day 18= if on the small side will go without water until early day 19 when we up the humidity for hatching.

 

[jen1234]

Okay, I will do so as told. I will keep you updated and will buy the hydrometer today at walmart. Thank you very much!

 

[jen1234]

I did the hydrometer as told and it read 63%. I took all the water out I just did the candling and found a small air cell how it's shown on the picture for day 7 I am actually on day 12 today and on another I did not see an air cell on another I saw one but very small. Since I took all the water out I hope the air cell grows enough for hatching day.