- Nov 12, 2007
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I set 12 eggs before the hurricane on the east coast. The humidity was constant at 25-30%. Even in a room where the huidity was 55-58%. I read on here somewhere that the humidity reader was not on the probe (which suprised me. duh) so I put the hole on the "reader" over a hole on the incubator to get humidity. I was surprised the humidity coming out of the incubator was so low considering the air going in the bottom was higher. Anyway, I added water several times and did not notice a change in the humidity in the incubator. So along comes the hurricane and of course I lost electricity. I hadn't heard any peeping and with the humidity so low I thought the eggs had died. Much to my surprise I heard peeping (complaining) coming from the incubator on hatch day. I checked the temp and it was only 76 degrees. I took the incubator outside and set it in the sun (the only way I had to raise the temps) constantly checking the temps inside the incubator with the probe. Covering and uncovering the glass on top with a towel I kept the temps good and hatched out 4 chicks (the best hatch ever). Considering that I did everything wrong (too low humidity, no lockdown, no heat for at least 10 hours, no extra humidity for hatching) I am surprised I got any chicks at all to hatch. Once they started piping I was afraid they would be too dry to hatch so I helped the first one out. It was plenty wet enough it could have turned around inside the egg to hatch. One other one that I helped still had blood vessels in the membrane so I left it in the shell. The next day I got it out of the shell because the membrane where I opened the shell was dry. The rest of the membrane under the shell was still wet.I still have one egg that has piped but that is all. I am going to get it out tonight. The rest I am going to open to see if I can tell when they died. I am going to try again with the still air method--put em in and forget them. Well maybe just not do much with them......
