Lockdown and automatic turner

[Finge]

I am stagger hatching two batches of eggs, Im going into lockdown for the first set of 13 eggs on Monday, can I keep them on the automatic turner, or do I need to remove it and hand turn the rest of the eggs until all of the first batch are hatched or are confirmed dead in the shell?

as for the other batch, will they be alright with the humidity going up for a couple days?

 

[JaeG]

You will need to take them out of the turner. In those last few days the chick positions itself for hatching so moving it can cause chicks to pip at the wrong end.

How far behind is the other batch? If they've been incubated for a week or more they'd probably do ok not being turned. Or can you pop the younger batch into something that you can take out, turn all the eggs then return them to the incubator so you aren't leaving the incubator open and reducing the humidity too dramatically for the older eggs.

A few days of higher humidity shouldn't worry the other batch. Just perhaps reduce it to 40% when you can until they go into lockdown.

Good luck with both your hatches. If the first batch of eggs look full and dark when you candle them they should still be alive.

 

[Finge]

They'll be a week old on the first batch's 19th day. Thank you for the advise, I plan on adding a third batch after the first is done so i'll have a week and a couple days between each hatch, as I plan on selling the first batch immediately and keeping the second batch.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Take out as many as needed of the auto turner rails to lay the soon to hatch eggs on the bottom of incubator. That way the the younger eggs can still turn and older eggs wont. This wont work if you have a still air incubator, you'll have to mark eggs and hand turn. Temp variance at two levels would be too much in still air.

After the high humidity period of hatch is over run the incubator dry. No water at all to speed up the water loss in the second batch. This will make up for the days at high humidity when no water loss occurred due to high humidity. I've done this a few times before and in candling found the second batch had to run dry right up to time of second "lock down". Candle you eggs to confirm the need to run dry second batch.

 

[Finge]

I dry all my eggs, so that won't be too hard, and I do have a still air incubator.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

If you run dry incubation anyway then my suggestion is to mark the younger eggs and take out the turner all together. Manually rotate the younger to day 12 or 14. That's all they need. But the big difference in temperature at turner level and floor of incubator is too much to keep the turner in with still air unit. Well, not an absolute but certainly a reduced hatch rate if turner kept in a still air with your situation.

 

[Finge]

Okay, thanks for all the input!

 

[Finge]

Welp, I think all those eggs died, It got to 104 while I was at school, so it wasn't for long I hope, would they terminate the eggs? As it's day 23 and there hasn't been a single peep, nor pip.