Shipped eggs and new incubator, horrible hatch rate.

[Photolady]

My first time having eggs shipped to me. I had three different shippers.

The first batch of 14 eggs in incubator One: I had 12 show growth at week 1, but at week 2 only 3 were still growing. The rest stopped.

Second and third batch (6 and 15) in incubator Two: I had 19 with growth at week 1. At week 2, I have 3 for sure and possibly a 4th.

The firsts here are new incubators and shipped eggs.

I have two different generations of the Harris Farms 360 which are both new from the box. Before this I used a home made cabinet incubator and local eggs, which I have had great success with. I had lent out my cabinet incubator and the 360s had good reviews so I tried them.

I am really not sure what to troubleshoot here. With three different shippers, (all which were packed well) and I let all the eggs sit and settle for about 48 hours before putting them in. Also two different incubators (which I monitored several times a day to check temp and humidity). This has been a very expensive and depressing experience. I would love input on any of these factors.

I am getting local eggs next week, but now I am hesitant to put them in if it could be the incubators.

 

[mdees88]

Even with higher quality incubators I still never trust the on board temp/humidity readings.

Do you have an external thermometer/hygrometer that you know is accurate or can test the accuracy of so you can see of the 360's are reading correctly.

Considering so many eggs developed the first week I would think it's more of an incubator issue than a shipped egg issue.

You said 19 were growing first week and only 3 second week. Did you leave the rest of the eggs in incase you misdiagnosed some of the possible "early quitters"?

What temp and humidity are you set at?

Could you possibly have had a power outage between week 1 and week 2?

 

[Shadow_Demonx92]

I'm not sure if it's incubator or what but i was given some advice for higher hatch rate with my shipped eggs. One thing you can try is not turning them for 7 days once in the incubator.

 

[Photolady]

Even with higher quality incubators I still never trust the on board temp/humidity readings.

Do you have an external thermometer/hygrometer that you know is accurate or can test the accuracy of so you can see of the 360's are reading correctly.

Considering so many eggs developed the first week I would think it's more of an incubator issue than a shipped egg issue.

You said 19 were growing first week and only 3 second week. Did you leave the rest of the eggs in incase you misdiagnosed some of the possible "early quitters"?

What temp and humidity are you set at?

Could you possibly have had a power outage between week 1 and week 2?

I pulled the eggs at two weeks with no growth. The veins had all completely retracted so they were done. I have thermometers in both of the incubators, but I also have been struggling with the accuracy of them. It might be that the incubator is a little off on the low side. Maybe by a degree or two, if the thermometer I am more confident in is accurate. But I really have no way to test the accuracy of the thermometers.

 

[mdees88]

Trusting a thermometer is tough. I have 6, 3 are no good and 3 read within .5F of each other so i always use those...

Do you have a medical thermometer? They're generally very accurate and are designed to read around the 100 degree range. You could set it and your other thermometers inside the incubator and see how they differ....

 

[Photolady]

Trusting a thermometer is tough. I have 6, 3 are no good and 3 read within .5F of each other so i always use those...

Do you have a medical thermometer? They're generally very accurate and are designed to read around the 100 degree range. You could set it and your other thermometers inside the incubator and see how they differ....

I don't have one that could be used in an incubator. Just the thermal kind. In my cabinet incubator I built the most accurate ones seem to be the inexpensive reptile ones from the pet store. 4 of 5 of those were reading the same temperature and the fifth was 2 degrees higher. I will probably put my trust in those and balance off of that and see what happens.

I also bought two of these after reading about them on this forum: https://amzn.to/2SwNtX3
I just put them in and according to these, they are reading the incubator temp low.

 

[Knighstar679]

I have gotten that one too. I like it. My NR360 is really good but as far as I can tell the temp might be .5 off.
How open is the vent on the incubator? I know that if it is closed to much that it does get the right air exchange. I open it a little farther each week to make sure that the eggs are getting enough air.

 

[mdees88]

Off topic but I see your name is photolady. That's an awesome Avatar pic, did you take it by chance. I just started a thread on wildlife photography the other day and I'm hoping some people will join in and share their pics. If you have any wildlife pics you've taken feel free to post them there or you can just check out the thread if you want. Here's the link....

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/wildlife-photography.1367815/

 

[Photolady]

Off topic but I see your name is photolady. That's an awesome Avatar pic, did you take it by chance. I just started a thread on wildlife photography the other day and I'm hoping some people will join in and share their pics. If you have any wildlife pics you've taken feel free to post them there or you can just check out the thread if you want. Here's the link....

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/wildlife-photography.1367815/

Thanks. Yes, I am a photographer but I am terrible at wildlife. The picture was one of my first baby chicks from 3 years ago.

 

[Photolady]

I have gotten that one too. I like it. My NR360 is really good but as far as I can tell the temp might be .5 off.
How open is the vent on the incubator? I know that if it is closed to much that it does get the right air exchange. I open it a little farther each week to make sure that the eggs are getting enough air.

I have it at half. I can open it a little more. I was under the impression from the manual that the vent helped keep the humidity, not necessarily air flow.