This is getting on my Nerves!

[BlueCamas]

I have a homemade "cooler-bator" and I set it up to see if I can hold a stable temp. I have some fertile eggs that I want to get in there asap, but I'm having issues. I think I will be able to get to a stable temp, but the humidity? I can't get the dang thing to get over 26

I've had it on for 4+ hours and I have a bowl with water and two sponges. What else can I do to get the humidity up? The humidity has to be 45-50 until the last week where it has to be 80-85, right?

I really want to buy a real incubator

 

[The Chickeneer]

It doesent necesarily have to be 45-50% humidity. Allot of people do dry hatches, which has humidity from like 20-30% I think. Look up dry hatching on the forum and read some threads on it. Some people swear by dry hatching, others like to do it wet but its up to you. Goog luck

 

[kevs-chickadees]

Are you sure your gauge is correct? I think you have to calibrate them. If your getting your temp to stay pretty constant I would think with two wet sponges that your humidity would be high?

 

[BlueCamas]

I'm pretty sure the thermometer is correct, I have two in there; a brand new digital ACU-RITE that reads both temp and humidity and a regular glass thermometer that I know is accurate.
Any way, the temp is now a stable 99 and I have the humidity up to 31. I need to tinker with it more before i pop the eggs in, but hopefully I can get the eggs in by tomorrow night.

 

[adillenal]

New or not, I would personally calibrate any new thermometer and/or hygrometer that I purchase. You would hate to find out too late that your new thermometer is off. My Dh bought a brand new thermometer for outside and it is way off. Says it is below 32 when it is more like 40. It is worthless.

And I have found it takes longer than 4 hours to get an accurate reading when setting up an incubator.
Good luck with your project.

 

[bairo]

It takes a while for the humidity to come up with a dry surrounding. I dont even check mine until 24 hours. Then i make adjustments. 25-35 is fine, then let it go up on day 18. Of course that is controversial and is sort of a modified dry hatch, but it seems to work well. Do you have a fan in the bator?

 

[cva34]

Quote:
X-2 on that" New" DONT MEAN RIGHT ...cva34

 

[3forfree]

I had issues with my humidity too, right now I have a jelly jar with a paper towel in it and it works pretty good keeping the humidity at 30-35%. I used a sponge in the jar, but it didn't work like the paper towel. I have the paper towel about 1/2 out of the jar, and the jar is only filled 1/2 way. If I put more water in the jar, the humidity goes way up. If I don't leave the paper towel out of the jar, the humidity goes down. These are what works in my home made styrofoam incubator. I also have a dry sponge near the eggs and if I put water on it, the humidity will climb to 70% so I'll use that for lockdown.

 

[mommy3]

Also keep in mind the humidity in the room as well. Maybe set up a humidifier near your bator. I also did a homemade coolerbator this september, the other thing I learned was to use warm water in your bowl. That helps as well. I was/ am a total newbie to all of this and was told by "experts" that my humidity was way to high- we went by all info we found online. We ended up with a 50% hatch - they say 40% is good so do what you can. We had a power outage during the incubation as well so try not to be too crazy- I was! good luck!

 

[BlueCamas]

I compared the digital thermometer to a glass one and they read about the same maybe a digit or so off. I wouldn't know how to change the digital one anyway, it's a pretty simple gadget. I have had the temp solid at 100f for an hour and a half and got the humidity up to 39

Good? I'm still going to let it sit for a long while and tinker with it more before I think of setting any eggs.