The metal things are just covers for your vents...mine came with screen plugs instead of the waffle thingy...the rubber grommets go in the lid vents then the metal part goes inside of those. There is no need to remove the metal or rubber part of the top vents....hence why they are mesh or have holes...the purpose of the screen or holes to keep junk out of your bator and chick fuzz in.
I have had to reduce my temp to 37.3. I have had a couple of times after opening that the temp has spiked. Anyone else had this happen?
The temp spikes because of ambient humidity. If you turn on your incubator when it is empty(before modifications, dont add water) let it heat up and run for 24hrs....see what the humidity read out on the front of the unit is it should read low as you didnt add water. Then turn off the incubator(otherwise it will be beeping at you) and hold up the front of the lid for about a minute...replace the lid and turn the bator back on...you can visually watch the humidity read out rise, then level off and then start to drop back down. What is happening is that the air inside the bator is 99F roughly, so it literally cooks off some of the humidity in there...when you open it you let in more humidity and it spikes up...along with temp because wet air is easier to heat up then dry air and the incubator is running at full speed because it is trying to recover from the heat loss of lifting the lid. (i hope i wrote that so it makes sense)
The temp thing is driving me bonko. It is hard to trust. I decided to stick with this temp as the two thermometers are reading the same. The digitals I have read higher! So maybe trusting them last time killed some of my eggs? I figure I will stick with this and see the hatch rate. I was higher on my first hatch and lower on the second- hatch rates were 55%, BUT I feel the eggs got chilled in lockdown. The insulation was a perfect idea.
Anyone ever hatched in the styrofoam bator?
I remembered I have a little 2.5 foot by 4.5 foot fridge in the bus I could convert to a bator....hmmmm......
We have 1 real janoel, 1 LG, 1 farm innovations, and one homemade cabinet. We incubate in the LG and the Janoel then we hatch in the farm innovations and cabinet...i also set goose eggs in the cabinet.
If you want to covert your fridge...i forgot the math for vent size and number but we have one of those small wine coolers we converted and we used 12 1/2" holes in the back wall(6 on top, 6 on bottom) We then put two lights on the floor, went to
walmart and bought a tiny cheap blue metal personal fan that we lay on the floor so it is blowing at the floor. We then drilled a hole in the top of the bator and installed an STC 1000 and dropped the probe down into the cabinet at the level of the egg rack...the thing is rock solid and has a full glass door.
Lockdown today!
I decided I would candle to be sure there were no quitters. On the third egg I witnessed one trying to pip internally so I quickly shut it down. That was a first for me. Pretty cool! Anyone ever see that?
I think I am off by one day. I was unsure as I had a power surge and my counter reset! I was so harried this last month that I didn't mark the date on my calendar. This really highlights how with so many hatches, breeds and genetics I have to get my stuff together!
ANyone here care to share how they band their chickens to keep them straight?
Yes i very often see internal pips when i candle before lockdown. No need to freak the eggs are absolutely fine being totally taken out of the incubator for 20 mins at any stage.
For banding our chicks we hate the idea of toe punching or wing banding as both are permant and we are just against it...not that i think anyone else is wrong for doing it, thats not what i am saying, it just isnt for us... We use zip ties and i keep the color for each breed in my head lmao..i know awesome idea not to write it down right..not. i will get to it eventually....anyhow the only issue with zipties is you have to change them about 3 times before adulthood because they get to tight a good alternative idea is loom bands. i need to go pick some up but so far the colors we use are as follows.
Blue - Iowa Blue
Purple - EE
Green - OE
Black - Back Australop
Yellow - Buff Orphington
White - Isa Brown
Red - Black Java
Anything with a top knot, frizzled, or silkie we do not band because they are easily identified. Bantam do not get banded because i have breeds that hatch out looking very different. Naked necks dont get banded because.....they have naked necks lol.
Wow Bramble that is amazing. Maybe I need to lower the temp around hatch?
Personally I'm frustrated with my hatches. This was the best at 64%. I had 5 fully formed, veins receded that didn't filp! I am really starting to blame my bator. I don't know what to say here folks. It seems like something is happening here that shouldn't be?
i have had chicks hatch in the turner cups but it is a much slower hatch for me and seems to make the chicks a lot more tired....i have hard more then on bantam chick that could not get out of the shell, i had to lay the cups down then they got up and walked away. So now i hatch everything laying down as much as i can...sometimes i miss an egg that is due to hatch because i do staggered hatches and sometimes i only set one egg for that lockdown day. If your chicks are to moist they will be swollen up and unable to flip.
I came down this morning to my bator off.
I had 2 different sets of project eggs in there and I was 2 days from lockdown
I CAN'T believe it. I have it on and will check tonight but they were cold. I mean cold.
I have had the bator off for up to 4 hrs and still had a 70% hatch....had the bator off for 6hrs and had a 50% hatch...so they definately are hardy buggers.
I have a problem. When I went to get eggs the gentleman blessed me with extras. 48 total and I have another dozen as well to set! I have 2 bators with turners right now-one half full! It is going to be tight, oh darn...
i had shipped eggs i traded for and bought as well as local eggs. I traded for 9 serma eggs...i got sent 22. i traded for 2 goose eggs i got sent 3. i traded for 4 turkey eggs i got send 9. i was exspecting 12 bought eggs they sent 42 eggs. i had a replacement order of 12 eggs i was getting they send 18. So total i was exspecting 39 eggs i got sent 94 and then the other half brought home 3 dozen local eggs to hatch.....talk about being in a bind and lack of space lmao. i always appreciate people being generous but everyone was generous at once lol. i ended up setting my incubator full...candling at 3 days taking out clears and putting in new eggs....candling at 3 days again and repeating...moving lockdown eggs as i went and taking eggs from the big cabinet bator and replacing them in my bators on auto turners....in about 2 weeks we ended up with everything in auto-turners.
Yeah my feed bills are not cheap. $7000 CDN for 30 tonnes of unmilled grains. (that will feed my pigs chickens and turkeys for 1 season) I got a feed program through a bio-ag company, so my grain ratio comes mixed. I just have to mill it. It's a 16% protein mix. (i'll have to add Soy
to my turkey feed if I want them to be successful with them)
If you mean your going to have to add soy to bump up protein level....look into corn meal gluten...it is what we use for our ducks. We dont feed soy..yuck!!
