Is it ok to have low humidity sometimes?

[ChickenGirl555]

I set 5 eggs in my incubator on Monday at 5:30pm, and I candled then last night, after reading how you should see veins in 2-3 days...but I didn’t see anything.

Now I’m worried that they died or never started growing because of humidity. I always watch the humidity when I’m home, but when I’m asleep for 7-8 hours or working for 8 hours, I’m not there to check the humidity. When I come home or wake up it’s usually in the low 30s for % if humidity. I always have at least a cup of water in the incubator and then I always put hot water on a sponge I cut up and put in the incubator when the sponge is dry. But it never lasts long enough to stay at the right % before I’m home or awake.

Is this a big problem? Could they have died? Or am I being too impatient? I plan to re-candle on Saturday morning, and because it’s always freezing, I am worried I won’t be able to replace the eggs with new ones if they ARE all dead by the time I want to set them so they’ll hatch on a certain day.

 

[wleigh1021]

low 30's is no problem. People do "dry hatching" with no added water and still have success. I don't usually candle until day 5 as this is when it is clear as to whether or not the eggs are developing. If at that point you see no veins than more than likely they were just never fertile. This website has useful info and pictures, you should check it out. https://www.raising-happy-chickens.com/hatching-chicken-eggs.html

 

[nchls school]

You may have a surprise on Saturday. Whoever said you could candle at the 2nd or 3 rd day is misinformed. 5 or 6 days is more like it. Humidity did not kill your eggs. Where did you get the eggs??

 

[Shamo Hybrid]

I was able to successfully hatched chicks at a 30-40% humidity range throughout their incubation process...... all of them hatched apart for 1 that pipped and all that stuff but never made it out of the shell.