Incubation hell, do we stand a chance?

[otis7]

It all started when our lovely little rooster was killed by a red tail. This was the first chicken we lost to a predator, and we were distraught. So we decided to be a little crazy, and collected eggs (he only mated with one of four hens) from our red hen. We collected the eggs she laid up to five days after he was killed. We built a styrofoam incubator, simple. Cooler with glass top, 25 watt light bulb surrounded by wire, dish with sponges and an accu-rite thermometer/humidity detector. After a few days of experimentation we felt we had the incubator at the right time, it fluctuated between 99 and 100. We put the eggs in, and i feel like it's been disaster ever since.
The temp as gone as high as 104, but I'm not sure how long. We do get up and check them 2x through out the night and regulate temperature by a blanket over the incubator that we pull back /put on if things get hot or cold. At day 7 I canceled and I saw an eye/ veins in two of the 5 eggs. The other three have a dark shadow on top. Last night, day 9, the light bulb went out and temps dropped to 90. We caught it within an hour, tried to correct the temp, and it went up to 104, after two hours, we balanced back down to 99 100. I canceled and I still see what looks like a moving embrio in two, the other three still show a dark shadow. Do we stand a chance of hatching these with such temperature changes? On average they go up to 102 and drop to 97 through out the day.

 

[otis7]

Candled. Sorry, typed way too fast.

 

[AmericanMom]

You might still have a chance, When I incubated temp went to 104 for almost an hour...out of the 23 that made it to lockdown 20 hatched
I also had problems with humidity and temp flux for the duration....I did get a couple sticky chicks but that was more because so many were hatching at the same time it sent the humidity through the roof... I would stick with it unless your absolutely sure they aren't viable

 

[otis7]

Thank you! That is encouraging. The two eggs that appear to be developing (grey dot at top of egg that moves around with veins coming out of it) are closer to the bulb than the two eggs that have the shadow (dark at the top of the egg, no movement). We won't give up till they are rotting, we are fairly determined despite how disastrous it's been. All the eggs are fairly pourus when candled. I'm still curious how much temperature variation eggs can withstand, and I hope it's a lot!

 

[AmericanMom]

Thank you! That is encouraging. The two eggs that appear to be developing (grey dot at top of egg that moves around with veins coming out of it) are closer to the bulb than the two eggs that have the shadow (dark at the top of the egg, no movement). We won't give up till they are rotting, we are fairly determined despite how disastrous it's been. All the eggs are fairly pourus when candled. I'm still curious how much temperature variation eggs can withstand, and I hope it's a lot!

I thought several times I had screwed up...along with eggs I had gathered from my hens I ordered a few online through ebay...the day I added those ones they broke open and I had to stop everything, remove the eggs and sanitize the incubator and obviously I still had a successful hatch lol... mind you I started with a full incubator but along the way tossed non fertile and questionable, looking back, I shouldn't have tossed the questionable, they may have done just fine, it was my inexperience and not wanting to deal with rotting eggs that caused me to chuck them.

 

[randerson846]

Whenever I was hatching me chicks mine also fluctuated a few degrees above and below but they were fine and most of them hatched so don't worry they should be fine

 

[otis7]

Does anyonenhatch with a wood stove as their houses only heat source? I think this is a big part of our problem. We had to get up once an hour last night because it warmed up outside and we had a fire going, the eggs kept shooting up to 102. Ugh

 

[AmericanMom]

Does anyonenhatch with a wood stove as their houses only heat source? I think this is a big part of our problem. We had to get up once an hour last night because it warmed up outside and we had a fire going, the eggs kept shooting up to 102. Ugh

I have only wood heat, noticed that putting a little space heater in the room helps, kept the temp around 65 I didn't incubate in the room where the wood stove was, have a spare bedroom that I placed them in

 

[NinjaRooster]

I think they will be fine. I had a VERY similar setup to yours, and my temp at one point got all the way up to 116 (not sure for how long, probably not more than 1/2 an hour). I figured I had probably hard boiled them; nope!
7 out of the 9 hatched.

 

[otis7]

Thanks for the encouragement! Fingers crossed, I truly just want this to be over! Taking care of peepers is soooo much easier than eggs!