Incubators Anonymous

[PD-Riverman]

Hello my name is Kayla and Im a hatchaholic.

Good to know there is more of us. Almost 2 years ago I put a few eggs in my Styrofoam incubator, a few weeks later I built a cabinet that holds 288 eggs, then built a hatcher, then bought another couple cabinets, then I ended up hatching over 5600 chicks before I turned off my incubators, I took a break----few months later I put 144 more eggs in the incubator, hatched them, well no problem, I just put 288 more eggs in the incubator 4 days ago-----I guess I am not a hatch-aholic, I became a PURE Sot Drunk hatch-aholic!!!!

 

[KernH]

Good to know there is more of us. Almost 2 years ago I put a few eggs in my Styrofoam incubator, a few weeks later I built a cabinet that holds 288 eggs, then built a hatcher, then bought another couple cabinets, then I ended up hatching over 5600 chicks before I turned of my incubators, I took a break----few months later I put 144 more eggs in the incubator, hatched them, well no problem, I just put 288 more eggs in the incubator4 days ago-----I guess I am not a hatch-aholic, I became a PURE Sot Drunk hatch-aholic!!!!

That's funny! I laughed out loud. Kern

 

[gander007]

Hello my name is Kayla and Im a hatchaholic.

Alright Kayla, the first step is to recognize the problem and the second is to admit your problem to others and the third stem is to join a group of hatchaholic's but here there is really no recovery plan just fellow hatchaholic's dealing with their ism and showing off their latest hatch so Kayla please have a seat pull yourself up to the keyboard and bang away with your photos and story's of your hatches

My Easter Hatch Along chicks are getting so big and so fast ...

 

[KF0002]

Good to know there is more of us. Almost 2 years ago I put a few eggs in my Styrofoam incubator, a few weeks later I built a cabinet that holds 288 eggs, then built a hatcher, then bought another couple cabinets, then I ended up hatching over 5600 chicks before I turned off my incubators, I took a break----few months later I put 144 more eggs in the incubator, hatched them, well no problem, I just put 288 more eggs in the incubator 4 days ago-----I guess I am not a hatch-aholic, I became a PURE Sot Drunk hatch-aholic!!!!

Alright Kayla, the first step is to recognize the problem and the second is to admit your problem to others and the third stem is to join a group of hatchaholic's but here there is really no recovery plan just fellow hatchaholic's dealing with their ism and showing off their latest hatch so Kayla please have a seat pull yourself up to the keyboard and bang away with your photos and story's of your hatches My Easter Hatch Along chicks are getting so big and so fast ...

Thanks guys for the welcome! We crank out our fair share of chicks every year. We hatch so much we wore our old sportsman out. We sold the old girl and bought a smaller Genesis incubator in an attempt to "limit" our hatching until after I got out of nursing school. Yeah it didnt work out. As much as I love my Genesis, it is worlds apart from our old sportsman so I just placed an order for a new digital 1502 sportsman a few days ago. So excited!! I miss the capacity of a sportsman so Im looking forward to having one again. My Genesis has a whopping capacity of 42 in the turner. I have had to stack eggs on top of eggs and its driving me crazy! Lol.

 

[allybookbook85]

I am going to play with it and see.  Fans are going to be easy. I use them to try to evaporate the water and move it and the heat UP.  Now that I have a fogger and read the instructions... I need to find a way to keep adding water as the water level can't be above about 2 inches.  I am thinking a drip system to add water.  I have a 5 gal bucket with a plastic tube but it was not air tight and didn't work for a gravity system BUT if I can get a drip fitting for the pipe or adapters I can adjust my water drip to match the evaporation of the fogger.  I see some science experiments in my future.  We will see.........

hi hope i'm not too late to join in this discussion. I have a 48 egg janoel8-48 and find it is really hard to keep the humidity high during hatching and lock down. I tried adding sponges, moist towels, even topped up warmed water with a large syringe fitted with 4mm tube so i could add water through the top vent insteed of opening the lid. I also considered a fogger but would be difficult to fit in there. I was reading your water tray top up issue and a light bulb went off in my brain, you can drip water in controlled amounts with a saline drip bag and extension set used to deliver intravenous fuids to animals, a vet supply shop or ask your local vet to save an empty bag and extension then just fill with water, i work in a vet clinic and you can manually adjust fluid rates by hanging the bag higher than the outlet and adjusting the clamp and timing how many drips a minute (or every 15 secs times 4) sounds complicated but it is very easy.

 

[allybookbook85]

hi hope i'm not too late to join in this discussion. I have a 48 egg janoel8-48 and find it is really hard to keep the humidity high during hatching and lock down. I tried adding sponges, moist towels, even topped up warmed water with a large syringe fitted with 4mm tube so i could add water through the top vent insteed of opening the lid. I also considered a fogger but would be difficult to fit in there. I was reading your water tray top up issue and a light bulb went off in my brain, you can drip water in controlled amounts with a saline drip bag and extension set used to deliver intravenous fuids to animals, a vet supply shop or ask your local vet to save an empty bag and extension then just fill with water, i work in a vet clinic and you can manually adjust fluid rates by hanging the bag higher than the outlet and adjusting the clamp and timing how many drips a minute (or every 15 secs times 4) sounds complicated but it is very easy.

Another way which is trickier is to get some irrigation supplies and use a dripper at the chosen volume they come in 2l to 8l an hour etc and plumb it in to your mains water or set up some kind of gravity feed...

 

[DMRippy]

hi hope i'm not too late to join in this discussion. I have a 48 egg janoel8-48 and find it is really hard to keep the humidity high during hatching and lock down. I tried adding sponges, moist towels, even topped up warmed water with a large syringe fitted with 4mm tube so i could add water through the top vent insteed of opening the lid. I also considered a fogger but would be difficult to fit in there. I was reading your water tray top up issue and a light bulb went off in my brain, you can drip water in controlled amounts with a saline drip bag and extension set used to deliver intravenous fuids to animals, a vet supply shop or ask your local vet to save an empty bag and extension then just fill with water, i work in a vet clinic and you can manually adjust fluid rates by hanging the bag higher than the outlet and adjusting the clamp and timing how many drips a minute (or every 15 secs times 4) sounds complicated but it is very easy.

I have something similar. My hubby had to have a catheter. I have the hose we drained it with and I had that on a 5 gallon bucket. I can get PLENTY of water in the hatcher, I just can't get the humidity to go above about 45%. Someone suggested a puppy puddle pad. I could put those on each level of the hatcher and that might up the humidity. I really don't need to worry about it till day 20 and 21. I lost about 4 or 5 chicks to shrink wrapping and I would like to STOP that and I think I can.... just have to figure out what to do. It is just SO BIG and getting the humidity up and keep the temps up is a trick.

 

[allybookbook85]

I have something similar.  My hubby had to have a catheter.  I have the hose we drained it with and I had that on a 5 gallon bucket.  I can get PLENTY of water in the hatcher, I just can't get the humidity to go above about 45%.  Someone suggested a puppy puddle pad.  I could put those on each level of the hatcher and that might up the humidity.  I really don't need to worry about it till day 20 and 21.  I lost about 4 or 5 chicks to shrink wrapping and I would like to STOP that and I think I can.... just have to figure out what to do.  It is just SO BIG and getting the humidity up and keep the temps up is a trick. 

The puppy pee pads could work, I was going to try that with the dripping system as my inc tends to go through the water and dry it out quickly, temp isn't an issue now where I live which is NSW Australia. Sorry I can't help much with the fogger idea, other than a reptile fogger, there is foggers/misters used in irrigation but they need a powerful pump and special contollers to burst water at intervals so too expensive and tricky for your hatcher. You have given me a good idea though for my set up so good luck and thank you!

 

[PD-Riverman]

I just can't get the humidity to go above about 45%.

Have you used more than one meter to check the humidity? If you have water in it and you are getting a 45% humidity and you add more water surface---not depth and it still reads 45% something is wrong with that meter. Every incubator I got I can range from what the humidity is without water to 85 to 90%, I have done more than 90%---the chicks that hatched never dried off till I took them out.

 

[allybookbook85]

Have you used more than one meter to check the humidity? If you have water in it and you are getting a 45% humidity and you add more water surface---not depth and it still reads 45% something is wrong with that meter. Every incubator I got I can range from what the humidity is without water to 85 to 90%, I have done more than 90%---the chicks that hatched never dried off till I took them out.

I have 4 thermometre/hygrometer as i don't trust the inbuilt one, 2 battery 1 stand alone and the inbuilt one on the incubator, they are all in different areas of the tray so I take an average of all. I'm finding the inbuilt one is almost always spot on average which is good. But I just find it drys out after 3-4 days so I top up with 20 to 40 mls daily. I try to keep it around 50% first 18 days but have read dryer is ok too. Only problem now is the turner motor has seized so I'm hand turning now :-( I will contact the manufacturer to try get a new motor sent out asap so I dont lose precious humidity/heat as I turn!