to candle or not, can i open the bator?

[Gazinga]

ok, so i see on threads that you should never open teh bator when you get the eggs in there. BUt if i dont open it, how can i candle? Im confused? Also i take the eggs off the turner on day 18, right? should i just candle then? What do you guys do?

 

[pdsavage]

Day 18 you stop turning (yes take them off the turner)then up the humidity and thats when you do not open the bator.
I hand turn mine so I have to open it several times a day and turn em all (40 eggs) fast as I can.

 

[Black Feather]

I open my incubator at least three times a week.

I have a large cabinet sized incubator (Sportsman 1202) and I run staggered hatches with it. I put eggs in every weekend and every weekend I have a hatch that comes out.

The incubator gets opened when I put the eggs in on Saturday. Then I candle the eggs on Wednesday to check for fertility. I don't like leaving dud eggs in the incubator as all that heat and humidity starts to decompose them and I don't want any bad gasses in the incubator. It also gets opened when I add water, and of course to take chicks out, So, as you can tell mine gets opened quite a lot.

I think the key from my perspective is to open it as little as possible while a hatch is taking place. Remember a mama hen will get off her nest and leave the eggs for quite long stretches while she eats and poops throughout the natural incubation, but then doesn't move a lot once the chicks start to hatch.

Just my $.02.

Cheers,
Urban Coyote

 

[daisychick]

You can take them out to candle them up until day 18 and that is when the bator is supposed to go into lock down and not be opened until the hatch is over. I candled mine on day 7, day 14 and day 18.

 

[NYREDS]

Quote:

 

[pascopol]

Quote:
You should never open an Incubator after day 18 until hatch is completed to preserve humidity.

However you can open incubator between day 3 and 18 with no problems.
Mother hen leaves her nest every day and she hatches most chicks than any bator (I mean a good broody).