Nurture Right 360 Inside vs. Outside Ring

[Iluveggers]

Yes, mine is exactly like this. Perfect temps on the outer ring and 98.0-98.5 on the inside ring. I only realized after I just finished a hatch last Friday. I had marked the inner ring eggs. I think 14 out of 16 outer ring eggs hatched, but only 2 out of 6 inner ring eggs hatched. Both those 2 inner ring eggs hatched later than the others, AND one has an umbilical hernia.
I played around after the hatch, and if I raise the outer ring to 100.0-100.5, the inner ring seems to get to 99.3-5 so hopefully that will be a good compromise for both rings.

Do you rotate your egg placement? Every two days during my hatch, I opened the incubator and moved all the eggs to a different spot. That way they all got exposed to the center for a short time, and both sides of the ring (even though it was turning.)

 

[MerryFeather]

Yes, mine is exactly like this. Perfect temps on the outer ring and 98.0-98.5 on the inside ring. I only realized after I just finished a hatch last Friday. I had marked the inner ring eggs. I think 14 out of 16 outer ring eggs hatched, but only 2 out of 6 inner ring eggs hatched. Both those 2 inner ring eggs hatched later than the others, AND one has an umbilical hernia.
I played around after the hatch, and if I raise the outer ring to 100.0-100.5, the inner ring seems to get to 99.3-5 so hopefully that will be a good compromise for both rings.

Yes. Mine seems to run similarly to yours. When I run the incubator at 99.5 the inner ring was running too low and I lost all but one duck egg around Days 12-13. I tested the incubator with separate thermometers on each ring. The inner ring was a degree or more cooler and even the outer ring wasn't spot on. I am running a third batch right now. I have 3 eggs in the outer ring and am running the incubator at 100.5 to get the most stable temp in the outer ring closest to 99.5 that I can. If I drop it to 100.0 it goes into the 98s again. 100.5 seems to get me 100 average in the outer ring. Hopefully it works better and doesn't cause problems in the other direction. The eggs are on Day 17 so have made it further than the last 2 attempts.

 

[MerryFeather]

Do you rotate your egg placement? Every two days during my hatch, I opened the incubator and moved all the eggs to a different spot. That way they all got exposed to the center for a short time, and both sides of the ring (even though it was turning.

I was trying not to open the incubator at all until Day 7 and 14 for candling. I didn't know if candling the eggs every few days last time was contributing to them doing poorly. So I haven't been moving them in-between rings. But I run thermometers in both rings and they have stayed about a degree sometimes more cooler in the inner ring this attempt.

 

[Northstardreams]

Do you rotate your egg placement? Every two days during my hatch, I opened the incubator and moved all the eggs to a different spot. That way they all got exposed to the center for a short time, and both sides of the ring (even though it was turning.)

No, I didn’t know to do that last time, but I’m thinking of doing it next time/next year.

 

[MerryFeather]

Update...

My first attempt (inside ring) had 3 of 4 eggs dead at Days 12-14. One egg hatched successfully on Day 29. My second (inside ring) had 4 of 4 eggs dead at Days 12-14.

My hatching attempt using the outside ring finished today. I put the duck eggs in the outside ring (which is a degree warmer) and then increased the temp on the NR360 screen from 99.5 to 100.5. According to my Govee it held an average temp from 99.5 to 99.8. Sometimes it was higher. Sometimes lower when it was by the vent. It was the most stable I could get it. I did have to mess with the humidity all the time. It was much less stable running the incubator warmer.

I started with 5 eggs. 2 were not fertile. 3 eggs made it to lockdown. (No Day 12-14 deaths). 1 duckling died as it was most of the way unzipped. (It looked normal). 2 successfully hatched just hours before Day 28.

I'm not sure what I can change if I try again. Dropping the temp to 100 made the temps inside drop into the 97s. Increasing the temp helped but they were a tad early and the humidity was much harder to control. I couldn't fill the tanks on the incubator as the humidity would go over 60 even with just a splash of water. And then it would only last a few hours and would drop suddenly overnight. I then added some sprinkle container lids that fit in the turner which gave a smaller surface area and a much more stable humidity around 45. I'm not sure if that played a roll in death of the zipping duckling or not.

Here are a couple pictures of the new little guys.