To trust the auto-turner or not??

[Aussie Fluff]

Hi everyone!

We recently upgraded our old crappy yellow China incubator to a genuine Janoel and were so excited to try it out!
We did a batch of Pekin ducklings, with the last one hatching this morning, but it seemed the eggs were not being turned properly throughout the process as we lost quite a few that were stuck to the side of the egg, and almost all of the ones that hatched needing assisting as they were in very strange positions and not able to finish zipping on their own. They are all healthy and doing great now.

The new incubator has the classic 'rocking' auto turner, but we're now wondering if maybe it's not doing a good enough job? Our old incubator had the sme design and we had no issue with it.

So my question is, should we continue to trust the auto turner or start manual turning once a day as well? Has anyone else had this issue with an auto turner before?

Any advice/tips would be great!

 

[MysteryChicken]

Make Mark's on both sides of the eggs to see how they're being turned? I do this with my incuview incubator.

 

[LittleMiss92]

My incubator does 45degree angle turns. BUT. For example, it’s facing back at a 45degree angle and every 2 hours it turns to face forward but goes straight back to facing backwards again. Is this what yours is doing? I feel like it should go from facing backward to forwards and stay for two hours and the face backwards again.

 

[Jada22]

I would mark the eggs and watch how incubator is turning them. You could even experiment with some infertile eggs in there before adding fertile eggs. I wouldn’t trust the autoturner without being sure it’s doing what it’s supposed to. If it’s proven to be not working when you try marking I would contact the manufacturer but hand turn in between