New Dickey Incubator - 48 Bantam Eggs - All Done.

[swheat]

Ok, I have never sprayed eggs before to get the humidity up. Seems to me if it raises it any it wouldn't be for long before it evaporated. Have you closed up any of the vents? If you can, empty the water tray and add hot water, and see if your humidity goes up. You will increase the humidity for the whole incubator, then after the hatch let it go back down to your normal humidity..I don't think it will damage your other eggs still cooking. This is what I do, I usually have chicks hatching weekly. On side note: I use the "dry incubation method", so when I add Hot water to the water trays my humidity goes up to 78-80%.

"I'm interested in this answer since I always wondered how to up humidity in the hatching tray on bottom while the rest stays stable. I've been looking at the Ova-Easy by Brinsea and had the same question."

With the Dickey & Sportsman cabinet incubators you can not separate humidity levels between the hatching trays & your turning trays. If you increase the humidity it will rise for all contents of the incubator.​

 

[Sooner]

Great post MAllen!! I wait on pins & neddles to see how your hatch turns out! Good luck!

 

[speckledhen]

Quote:
With the Dickey & Sportsman cabinet incubators you can not separate humidity levels between the hatching trays & your turning trays. If you increase the humidity it will rise for all contents of the incubator.

That's sort of what I was thinking and wondering how much it might hurt a staggered hatch. Thanks!

 

[Chook-A-Holic]

I asked Mr. Dickey this before making my recent purchase two weeks ago,even though I got the seperate hatcher also. He told me that it would'nt hurt to place a small bowl of water on the hatching tray if misting did'nt raise the humidity enough. He also said that the humidity from hatching the eggs would'nt hurt the eggs still in the turner.

Also for those with seperate Dickey hatchers, he recommended a small bowl at the bottom of the hatcher for a more stable humidity.

 

[MAllen]

When I spoke with Mr. Dickey on the phone he told me to do it this way. He said to keep the trays in the top just like I've been doing, this provides the base humidity level, then to spray the eggs in the hatcher twice a day. I asked him about the humidity going up and he said I would not see it go up much on the meter, I just want to confirm with other users that all of this is correct and that it works for them.

 

[MAllen]

Quote:
Aha!! Ok, so in goes more water to bring the humidity up to 75%. If it won't hurt the other eggs that are still cooking then I'd rather do that than mess with spraying the ones in the hatcher.

 

[MAllen]

Well... not so fast I guess. I just called Mr. Dickey and aske him about this. He said that if I raise the humidity up for the eggs that are hatching it WOULD hurt the eggs that are still incubating, in fact he said I would run the risk of them not hatching at all.

He said specifically, to open the incubator 2 or 3 times a day and mist the eggs in the hatching tray with luke-warm water. So, that's what I'm going to do.

 

[Chook-A-Holic]

Quote:
It kinda makes me wonder why we get what seems to be different info. from the same person. Could it be, because I told that I hatched at 60%, and that by me hatching at that low of a humidity compared to 75% that adding a bowl of water at the bottom would'nt hurt the eggs.? I guess it makes sense to me.

 

[MAllen]

No idea why. When I first got mine he told me to keep the humidity at 55% while incubating, and the rest today about spraying the hatching eggs. I've see others post about misting the eggs in a Dickey incubator but I can't seem to find those posts now.

 

[swheat]

Like I said in previous post, I hatch weekly from the same Dickey incubator, I raise the humidity to 78-80% on the 18th-19th day til the eggs hatch... and the one still in the setting tray still hatch the next week when they are due. Guess you will have to do TRIAL BY ERROR.

I really don't think 3 day of higher humidity will destroy your other eggs.