I am an idiot, can it be fixed?

I would candle and see what you have. Just rember mama hen doesn't check to see which end is up. Good luck.

 

Um, there may be hope!!

 

You will likely be ok if you to reorient your eggs to the proper position NOW. Mama hens don't sit on their eggs with the big end up, at least not by much. The "egg" shape of the eggs and the bowl shape of the nest holds the egg in a slightly big end up position. Reorient your eggs with the big end towards the front of your incubator and with the little end pointing at the back. Nestle them into the stuff you have in your incubator so that they will stay in this big end slightly up position, don't try to stand them on end like a fence post. Or you could put them into clean used egg carton bottoms with the big end up to keep them from rolling around the incubator like billiard balls every time the egg turner cycles on. Chicks are wet at hatching and I am afraid that the leaves or whatever you have your eggs laying on will stick to and contaminate the new chicks. At the very least it could lead to some of the chicks getting navel infections.

What you really need is a hydrometer with both a dry bulb thermometer & a wet bulb thermometer also known as a psychrometer, to check the accuracy of your incubator's thermometer/hydrometer and to serve as a back up for your monitor. I don't trust monitors and hydrometers, give me a simple to operate, reliable, inexpensive, and dependably scientific instrument like a psychrometer. I know that a twin bulb psychrometer or hydrometer is old school but nothing works so well when checking RELITAVE humidity and a psychrometer will backup or help prove the accuracy of both your hydrometer, and your thermometer. However do use distilled water in the vessel that your wet bulb sock is sitting in. Tap water results in mineral deposits and that results in poor performance.

Here is some reading material.
https://www.gqfmfg.com/store/instructionscabinet.asp

Here is some more:
http://www.thepoultrysite.com/artic...atch-on-embryonic-mortality-and-chick-quality

The above scientific link says that there is NO difference between chicks that are dry incubated and chicks that are wet incubated (over 55% humidity) except that more of the DRY incubated chicks died in the shell. I don't think that this extra dry hatched mortality takes into account chicks that are shrink wrapped and suffocate at hatching just the ones that died before day 18. Your humidity is fine where it is. At day 18 you will need to INCREASE the humidity to 75% or 80%.

The vent holes help control humidity but they also help vent the carbon dioxide your chicks and eggs give off inside the incubator. Since CO2 is heaver than air it falls so you should have plenty of oxygen for the number of eggs you have setting by simply opening the bottom vents.

Here is a handy app that tells you how much relative humidity is in the air by using the most accurate method, a wet bulb / dry bulb psychrometer. Save it too your PC's tool bar or write the web address down. Just type the wet bulb and the dry bulb temperatures into it at the proper place and click
calculate.

http://www.ringbell.co.uk/info/humid.htm

I must assume that the air circulation fan in your GQF clone incubator is working properly, but you really seriously need to loose the pine straw or leaves in your turning tray in favor of a 100% real plastic egg holding tray. For now a few clean egg cartons will work. It will soon be very important where in the egg your chicks heads' are and also where their heads' are in relation to your peeps' bodies. Chicks that are out of position don't hatch, they die. It is even critical that a chicks' head is on the right hand side of its body and that its head is tucked under its right wing. At lock down take the eggs come out of the egg holders and lay them on their sides in the bottom tray of the incubator. There shouldn't be a turning mechanism in the bottom of the incubator, only a hatcher tray. If there isn't a hatching tray turn off the turner motor.

Remember that Mother Nature intended for her hens to sit on their eggs right on the bare arse ground and with nothing between the eggs, the dew and the rain but the hen and Mother Nature's Earth. I have experienced excellent hatches of "yard" chickens from hens who have stolen their nest away and who never had a human hovering over her and wringing their hands at the prospect of a good outcome. Chickens are tougher than we think, it is usually only when we humans get involved that problems pop up.

 

What I really really recommend is to use both the digital and the "Look at the evidence with your own eyes type of instrument." 99,5 degrees is not 99.5 degrees just because some digital read out says that it is. Let us know how your hatch went and buy yourself and extra wafer and control unit if your going to do a lot of hatching, those thermostat wafers have a bad habit of burning out at the most inopportune time.. With the bator that you have now you could do custom hatching for chicken newbees allover Shiner. But you better learn how to properly sterilize it first.