Questions about incubating Guinea Fowl Eggs!

[Eve Quirk]

Thanks so much for the info. My 3 turkeys must be lazy bums!

 

[RosieRooChicks]

Thank you for responding. I found the egg that had a smell and also found 11 viable eggs. Sad ! Yes I forgot to candle when moving to my incubator. The hen had left the nest and the eggs were cool. I don't know if the 11 will hatch.

 

[Tacampbell1973]

I had huge problems getting humidity to stay steady. I found the sponge method time wOrkney the best. I cut a sponge into small pieces, roughly about an inch . Fourban of these pieces does it for my 48 egg incubator. My smaller incubator I use one. I second the part about lock down. I continuously hatch eggs year round and they donto all start at the same time. Case in point, my Guinea nest had 30 eggs until last week One of my male Guins woke me up with his alarm scream so I stagger outside with my flashlight to find an absolutely GIGANTIC rather coon happily slurping down my guinea egg! So I politely asked hime to vacate my yard forthwith, yeah right in gave him the proverbial get the blank out of here. No sign of mama so I grabbed the eggs and took them all to my incubator. Apparently I had miscalculated themail to nest date. They were clear as a window pane. I was disappointed but left them in the incubator. Good thing too because I recandled last night and 75% now have blastoderms. I have now 3 ddifferent stages of eggs going in my incubator so no way really to make all of the babies happy.

 

[KatelynnRiedel]

Thank you so much for the info. One last question I know when they ducks are starting to hatch you see their bills and the air cell is very slanted. Will I see the beaks of the keets when they are getting ready to hatch to know to put them on lock down? or should I just do it on day 25?

 

[PeepsCA]

Yes, you should see beaks (internal pip) and the slanted air cells. But if not day 25 is usually the norm for lock-down, (depending on the brand of incubator). I use Hovabator 1588s, and my hatches are always a day or 2 early.

 

[KatelynnRiedel]

Thank you so much PeepsCA! You have wonderful infomation! Thank you for your time!

 

[Mmmaddie13]

Sorry to interject but I'm getting my first guinea eggs next week, and I'm at high altitude.. I am planning on having humidity around 45% and then upping it to 65% and candling when it comes close to time. Does that sound okay? I have pretty awful hatch rates when I hatch so I'm hoping this year will end up a bit better.

 

[KatelynnRiedel]

No problem. If anyone can get what they need from this subject ask all questions you have.

 

[PeepsCA]

Sorry to interject but I'm getting my first guinea eggs next week, and I'm at high altitude.. I am planning on having humidity around 45% and then upping it to 65% and candling when it comes close to time. Does that sound okay? I have pretty awful hatch rates when I hatch so I'm hoping this year will end up a bit better.

The humidity sounds good to me, but I'm only at about 1150-1200 ft elevation (and I have really low humidity here)... have hatched somewhere close to 2000 keets.

Guinea eggs are pretty forgiving, but hopefully someone that lives and incubates Guinea eggs at high elevation will have some input if anything needs a little tweaking.

What kind of incubator are you using?

 

[vlflower]

Ok I have a really stupid newbie question lol! This will be my first year with maturing guinea hens (I got them as keets last spring). I'm hoping to be able to incubate their eggs which will be a first for me. I know the cycle is generally 28 days.....but do we put the eggs in the incubator as soon as we find them, or can we collect a few and start incubating in batches? If so, how many days can we keep them before we start the incubation period and I'm assuming we would keep them at room temp?

Thanks for the help! Sorry if its a duh question!

Vicki