THE MOTHER'S DAY HATCH-A-LONG!!!! The last day to join in and set eggs with us is April 28th.

[Bigfamily4me]

I have a horrible time with lockdown. All sorts of viable lively chicks in the eggs. Then I go and bump the humidity to 75-80% for lock down and they die! I'm so frustrated!!! I do dry incubation. I get nice big air cells. But that's not enough. Im thinking may be I should raise the humidity no higher than 50% for lockdown. I really want my next eggs to actually hatch!!

 

[gwendalynn28]

the shells become more brittle as the chick grows because it is absorbing calcium from the shells in order to grow it's bones.. as the shells lose the calcium they become more brittle

yeah.. the hen doesn't increase the humidity at hatch.. but she is also incubating naturally...
lately (for chickens) I have been dry hatching in the Reptipro (not adding any moisture at hatch to see how the chicks fair).. they are hatching just fine since as soon as the first one pips the shell the humidity rises on it's own... just like it would under a hen (they are also being dry incubated).. I haven't lost a single egg that was growing an embryo.. I have also opened the door a lot to LOWER the humidity since I still have eggs incubating in the same bator

Now I couldn't attempt that in the Brinseas because of the location of the fans.. they HAVE to have more humidity to counteract that darn fan.. (and broody hens don't have fans on their bellies).. besides.. i refuse to try to HATCH anything anymore in the Brinseas since the Reptipro is doing an amazing job...

I will still raise the humidity for my goose and muscovy eggs when they move to teh Brinsea for hatch since this is something new I have been trying... and I don't want to play around with the goose and muscovy eggs since they were shipped and I paid for them

I do have a lone turkey eggs that my husband added because it was pure white.. so I will experiment with it and see how it does at hatch .. normally i would raise the humidity up to 80% for turkeys at hatch.. but I'll risk this one and see how it fares

I'm having the same problem at hatch. The membranes are drying out and sticking to the chicks. I had some hatch last weekend and after 24 hours of struggling I decided to intervene. I zipped the shell of the top of two eggs without touching the membrane. One chick got about halfway out and something started bleeding and it died. The other chick, even though it took it till the next morning, finally got out and is doing fine. I'm hatching again this weekend and I noticed the pip holes are looking dry again like last weekend. So now I'm getting frustrated as to what to do. I've got two hot wet sponges in my Little Giant forced air incubator, all the water trays filled, and two wet paper towels and barely tipping 70% which is good but I can't keep it up that way. It falls after about 2 hours and I have to open it and re-wet all the sponges and paper towels with hot water and snap it closed really quick! The humidity skips down to 60% for a couple of minutes and then rising again. Any ideas or suggestion would be greatly appreciated! The wet paper towel on the egg sounds like it could work but I have heard that you are not suppose to get the eggs wet....Does anyone know if this is true??? Also, I have the humidifier running by the incubator as well trying to raise the humidity in the house!! This crazy! I live in North Carolina where the humidity is smothering yet it won't rise in the incubator!

 

[yinepu]

I would not do that!!!!!!!!!!! I did a dry hatch on the turkey eggs and I lost the hole batch!!!!!!!!!

i've hatched out several thousand turkeys over the years.. so I know how they hatch.. but this little guy will be an "experiment" to see how well he fares with a dry hatch.. if it looks like he's having issues I know how to intervene..

as it is he wasn't supposed to even be set.. I was done hatching turkeys for this year.. but my husband put it in the bator.. I think he thought it was just a really BIG chicken egg since it was pure white with no spots at all.. lol

 

[mayberrygirl]

Fed Ex?   I ordered mine about a week and half ago!  Still waiting, at least they sent a notice saying it was shipped.  I was about to call them the first part of the week, then I got that e-mail.  It's .org isn't it?

Yes, .org. I got the email it was shipped on Thursday, but it went out Friday evening. On the email there should be a tracking number on it.


In other news... I have 4 pips! Tomorrow is our day 21!! So excited, this is just proofing to me already it was my styro hatcher that was the culprit for my bad hatches. Fingers crossed for the rest of the 13 eggies!

 

[mayberrygirl]

Ok, really happy that you mentioned Fedex here.  They never mentioned it on my order.  So, went to Fedex with the tracking number..which I promise..no Fedex mentioned, and tried it.  It worked..it is supposed to come by the 17th!  Next Thursday!  What? 
  Anyway, had tried usps with that number and ups with it, I just didn't figure it was Fedex because it's taking forever!  

I tried a multi look up site that looks up several shippers and nothing. I finally emailed them and they said it would be going out Friday and the shipper was fed ex. They are pretty nice and quick to respond. I think mine is so fast cause they are in Kentucky and I am just in North Carolina.

 

[yinepu]

I'm having the same problem at hatch. The membranes are drying out and sticking to the chicks. I had some hatch last weekend and after 24 hours of struggling I decided to intervene. I zipped the shell of the top of two eggs without touching the membrane. One chick got about halfway out and something started bleeding and it died. The other chick, even though it took it till the next morning, finally got out and is doing fine. I'm hatching again this weekend and I noticed the pip holes are looking dry again like last weekend. So now I'm getting frustrated as to what to do. I've got two hot wet sponges in my Little Giant forced air incubator, all the water trays filled, and two wet paper towels and barely tipping 70% which is good but I can't keep it up that way. It falls after about 2 hours and I have to open it and re-wet all the sponges and paper towels with hot water and snap it closed really quick! The humidity skips down to 60% for a couple of minutes and then rising again. Any ideas or suggestion would be greatly appreciated! The wet paper towel on the egg sounds like it could work but I have heard that you are not suppose to get the eggs wet....Does anyone know if this is true??? Also, I have the humidifier running by the incubator as well trying to raise the humidity in the house!! This crazy! I live in North Carolina where the humidity is smothering yet it won't rise in the incubator!

the eggs CAN get wet.. I've wrapped wet cloth around a bunch over the years as I was dealing with fine tuning new bators.. what you don't want is wet dripping rags where the chicks end up getting water dripping into the shells since the water can get into their nares and drown them
for now.. if it were me.. I would just lay a dry paper towel or cloth over the eggs to block the direct flow of air from the fan.. since your humidity if high they shouldn't need a wet one.. but if you find later on that they are still drying too much you can always dampen a washcloth and lay it over the eggs.. the problem is the fan.. NOT the humidity (60% is still fine.. so no worries there)

if possible leave them to hatch out on their own .. since a lot of time if they are slow it's because they are still shutting down the blood flow from the veins and absorbing their yolk.. if you assist too early it can cause them to end up like the chick that started bleeding..
I have nothing against assisting since this is artificial incubation.. however I believe that if you are going to assist you need to be cautious and patient..


edited to add..

Ignore the hygrometer.. if it's extremely humid there (and in your home) chances are that the hygrometer is way off...
you can calibrate it later.. but for now it's just stressing you out.. I'm sure it's plenty high enough for the chicks to hatch

 

[yinepu]

I have a horrible time with lockdown. All sorts of viable lively chicks in the eggs. Then I go and bump the humidity to 75-80% for lock down and they die! I'm so frustrated!!! I do dry incubation. I get nice big air cells. But that's not enough. Im thinking may be I should raise the humidity no higher than 50% for lockdown. I really want my next eggs to actually hatch!!

high humidity at hatch is only bad if the vents are closed off too much and the temp is still at incubation temp (99.5 for forced air)
the reason being is that hot humid air doesn't hold as much oxygen as cool humid air.. so it sounds like.. if all the chicks have nice large air cells .. that they are dieing it's due to carbon dioxide poisoning and not the humidity..

remember.. hot air holds less oxygen than cool air
humid air holds less oxygen than dry air
hatching chicks need oxygen
hot humid air can = dead chicks

the way to counter that is to have all vents / plugs OPEN at hatch.. and drop the hatch temp down 1 degree.. so if you are incubating at 99.5.. then when you raise the humidity at hatch lower the temp to 98.5 degrees


I also make sure there is good air flow in the room where the bator is located.. (not necessarily fans.. but no stagnant "dead" air) since that can also affect large hatches of chicks

if you only have a few eggs in a large bator it's not as bad.. since there is more oxygen to go around... but the more chicks you have that are hatching means you will need more oxygen

 

[Toxic Chicken]

My eggs are due to hatch Monday. So I'm just sitting around and waiting and waiting and waiting. I have a brinsea 20 Eco and I'm now worried about the fan issue. I'm having trouble getting The humidity up too. I have the bottom filled with water and two wash cloths the water was actually dripping out the bottom onto my table I had it so full. My humidity won't go over 58%
Seems very weird. No condensation or steamed up windows so I guess my hygrometer is
working. My house is at 46% RH so I don't understand. When I first got it I tested it filled one
Resivior with water put the top on and the humidity shot up to 50 something and the windows steamed up. Arg. Ooh lemme remove the sham wow cloths maybe try regular wash cloth. Maybe sham wow is messing me up.

Ok put in a regular wash cloth. The water in the reservoir was cool. WTH

Oh and when I had the cover off I checked the fan, it blows straight down onto where my eggs are. Why did they do that?

 

[what did I do]

Wow has alot happened since I went to work! Congrats to all the new chicks and sorry to everyone whos hatches didnt go so well. Always so discouraging. 

But I have a few questions. 

My hatch day isnt until May 20th (Next sunday) I have heard that the fans dry the chicks out before they can hatch. Mine is a Still air with a installed fan. I thought about disconnecting the fan when I went into lockdown but Im afraid the temp will fluctuate with the fan not running and kill the chicks growing. 

What should I do? Im really worried about this part. :/  I saw someone suggest a paper towl over the top. Will this work for mine? and will it actually help? Also will it suffocate the chicks? 

My incubator has a fan that you can't turn off, I don't have one of those thingies that tell you the humidity, and the kids keep opening it up go take chicks and shells out. The chicks are hatching without too many problems. I have @33. Chicks that are all doing well and all but 3 eggs have pips in them that I can see. I don't know, if you see a problem come up take care of it. I though it would be best if I put a wet wash cloth in mine after my son told me what all he was doing. I guess it is working well. I figure if they are going to hatch they will hatch.

I hope this eases your worry.

 

[BBAcres]

I can see 4 pips in our turkey eggs!!