Okay, few more questions....

[sellison]

With a little less condensation in the windows then your picture shows, I have 75 percent. I would open one of your vent holes, I feel the air right now is more important. If you have that much water in there, they should be fine. I have had more problems with drowning then shrink wrap.

Also the incubator with the heating in different places could be the heating element got bumped. I borrowed my incubator out once and it was reading like that. Hot in the back and low in the front. The element had gotten pushed around and it required my husband to do some re-bending and adjusting to get in back even. I should know better then to lend stuff but a person always wants to help out.

 

[AmyLynn2374]

With a little less condensation in the windows then your picture shows, I have 75 percent. I would open one of your vent holes, I feel the air right now is more important. If you have that much water in there, they should be fine. I have had more problems with drowning then shrink wrap.

Also the incubator with the heating in different places could be the heating element got bumped. I borrowed my incubator out once and it was reading like that. Hot in the back and low in the front. The element had gotten pushed around and it required my husband to do some re-bending and adjusting to get in back even. I should know better then to lend stuff but a person always wants to help out.

Drowning is the result from humidity too high during incubation, not hatch. I do agree with you though. I'd rather have the vents open and air in there. Of course, my vents are usually open for teh entire incubation unless I need to build up temp. I have that problem with my heating elements atm, one side heating hotter than the other. Of course it's an older bator.

 

[Bradfordj]

From the looks of those pics I would pull the plugs, get fresh air for hatching, monitor your temperature carefully, and ignore your hydrometer. There is plenty of moisture in there! That's my opinion. Hope your hatch goes well.

 

[fiset94]

Sounds like everyone is in agreeance with the plug pulling.. so I will do that now.... and then just monitor the temp.

I will keep ya posted on the hatch!!

 

[PattiS72]

What temp should the incubator stay in lock down?

 

[WalnutHill]

What temp should the incubator stay in lock down?

This is another subject where opinions vary and different methods work. I think a lot of it comes down to the heating profile of your incubator...

With my turkeys, I find that dropping the temp 1 degree Fahrenheit from days 24-28 (28 day incubation) helps with a successful hatch.

With chickens, I've not seen any difference with leaving the temp alone or dropping it.

 

[AmyLynn2374]

I don't drop mine and I don't believe the majority of chickens hatchers do. I have only seen the recommendation to drop temp in one place and I have read many many many sources of incubation methods. If mine does drop a degree or so on it's own, I don't worry about it, but I don't drop it.

 

[WalnutHill]

https://www.pasreform.com/academy.html is the resource.

https://www.pasreform.com/images/downloads/brochures/Pas_Reform_Academy_brochure_2012.pdf This is the most comprehensive article on incubation and hatching I have ever read.

Pas recommends a slight drop, as does Porter's. The chicks' own metabolism creates heat. If the incubator thermostat is not adaptive, the incubation temperature can rise and cause heat stress related problems.

Look up the Heat Index ratings for your own hatching temperatures. It makes sense to me that even a slight decrease in incubation temperature during hatch can lead to less stress on hatching chicks.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I’ve seen dropping the temperature mentioned in a few posts on here but I don’t recall ever seeing it in something from an authority or why it would be beneficial. I’m kind of skeptical and don’t quickly believe what I hear without having a reason along with it.

Late in hatch the chicks are creating heat on their own just like other living animals. I can certainly believe that dropping the temperature a bit won’t hurt them. In a still air incubator the temperature will drop a bit anyway if you take them out of a turner and put them on the floor since hot air rises and the floor is a little lower than in the turner, but I’ve never seen that mentioned as a problem. I don’t think it is.

A possible source for that suggestion is the commercial operations that may have 60,000 or even 120,000 eggs in one incubator have more problems getting rid of excess heat that keeping the eggs warm late in incubation. They don’t hatch in the incubator, they move them to a hatcher, but I could see with all that heat being generated they may shoot for a slightly lower temperature in the hatcher, but that’s just me guessing. I don’t know.

I’d love it if someone could give a good reason why it is beneficial. I don’t change my temperatures for hatch.

 

[AmyLynn2374]

https://www.pasreform.com/academy.html This is the most comprehensive article on incubation and hatching I have ever read.

Pas recommends a slight drop, as does Porter's. The chicks' own metabolism creates heat. If the incubator thermostat is not adaptive, the incubation temperature can rise and cause heat stress related problems.

Look up the Heat Index ratings for your own hatching temperatures. It makes sense to me that even a slight decrease in incubation temperature during hatch can lead to less stress on hatching chicks.

In that case lowering the heat is just lowering the heat not dropping the temp. Which most people (that do not have thermostats to adjust for them) should expect to have to do in the last week anyhow because of the chicks creating their own heat. I expect to have to drop the heat here in a couple days in order to maintain my 99.5 ish range.