Incubator lids?

[AwesomeChickenGuy]

So, I'm using a homemade incubator, but the humidity is around 30%. How can I raise the humidity and should I keep a lid over the incubator?

 

[BantyChooks]

What do you mean by lid? Incubators are generally enclosed to keep heat in if that's what you mean. 30% sounds like decent humidity for incubation. If you want it to increase for lockdown, increase water surface area via placing in pans of water.

 

[SegiDream]

So, I'm using a homemade incubator, but the humidity is around 30%. How can I raise the humidity and should I keep a lid over the incubator?

I would use a lid, otherwise how do you plan to keep the temp and humidity stable? The bator needs some small air holes, I only mention that in case it doesn't already have some before you put a lid on it. 30% humidity isn't that bad in the first 18 days. If you are just starting or about to start incubating you can try a dry hatch which means you do not add water (unless it gets down to 15%) until lockdown and at lockdown you raise it up to about 65%. I kept mine around 30-50% until lockdown when I bumped it up.

But to answer the specific question how to raise humidity, you need to add warm water. If you already have water in the incubator you need to increase the surface area of the water. That means using a wider container or adding a second container or some have added a sponge. I used a pan with two sizes of food storage containers. The small container was for the first 18 days, the larger one was for lockdown. I tested how to increase the humidity to the desired amount before I started incubating. A fan blowing over a water surface can also help speed up the evaporation process. If you have to open the incubator during lockdown then you can use a spray bottle and warm water to keep the humidity up, just don't spray the eggs. hth

 

[AwesomeChickenGuy]

Ok. Thanks for the help. And I don't really have a way to keep the temp stable (sadly)

 

[TheAlrightyGina]

Ok. Thanks for the help. And I don't really have a way to keep the temp stable (sadly)

That's...kind of necessary for incubation.

 

[AwesomeChickenGuy]

Oh....

 

[AwesomeChickenGuy]

Ok I'll send a picture

 

[AwesomeChickenGuy]

The humidity is now hanging around 17% and the temp is at like 110

 

[TheAlrightyGina]

The humidity is now hanging around 17% and the temp is at like 110

I'm sorry to say that's not going to work. Anything over 102 is getting perilous, 104 and up will kill the developing embryos.

ETA: I would suggest reading up on the subject as much as possible before you do this kind of thing. It's a relatively easy process but you need to know what you're doing and have a properly calibrated thermometer/hygrometer if you want to ensure success.

 

[Sierra G]

110 is too hot. If an embryo is developing that temperature will kill it. Ideally the temperature of your incubator won't fluctuate much and it will stay within the range of 98.5 to 101 with 99.5 being optimal for waterfowl and 100 being the sweetspot for chickens.

Here's why that is. When egg laying land animals evolved they laid lots of eggs on warm beaches, warm heaps of compost, or anything else that was warm and might hatch their eggs. Then they left because they weren't going to spend time raising their offspring. Because they laid lots of eggs and really didn't care when they hatched, a wider range of temperatures worked and the time to hatching was more variable. Although even then 110 probably would have killed most embryos.

The next evolutionary step toward chickens to consider is brooding. Before brooding an animal laid hundreds of eggs just to ensure enough of their offspring survived to maintain the species. With brooding rather than expending lots if resources going for quantity, evolution started selecting for qualities. The most important of these was that the eggs hatch as a group. If they hatch as a group the babies can be raised as a group.

To ensure that they hatched as a group some specific characteristics were selected for, temperatures, shell characteristics, yolk characteristics, etc. The eggs won't start developing until the right temperature is maintained for about four hours. Then it has to be maintained most of the time until incubation is complete. And, because a group of young is easier to raise than a bunch of random aged chicks, all of the specific characteristics of each species combine to standardize embryo development so they will ideally hatch within a few hours of each other. If, and only if, the needs of the egg are met.

Since you don't have a top on your incubator you can't emulate some of the important conditions in a nest. Humidity can't be regulated. Neither can temperature. And you're still going to have to turn the eggs and do some of the other things the bird that laid the eggs would do instinctively.

Your setup could be improved in many different ways. As I mentioned, your current heat source is too strong, you could move it further away and possibly get a safe temperature. But even if you made lots of tweaks your hatch rate would still be very low. There are lots of DIY incubators described on this site, on YouTube, and on maker sites. I'd recommend you view some of those and see what they have in common and then rethink your design.

I'll try to expand some of the ideas here into a longer article Thursday or Friday. If you have questions before then, feel free to ask.