What % is a good hatch rate?

[Nugget]

I will be getting some hatching eggs this week. I want only 1 pullet from this order, but I want to pretty much assure I will get 1! I was told I can have 12. My incubator only holds 3 (I wonder if I could cram some extras in...)

If I get 3, would you expect a good incubator to hatch 3? Maybe I can cram 5 in. I worry that if I get 3, and 1 or 2 hatch, and with my luck, they'll be cockerels and I'll be back where I am now! lol

What do you think?

 

[conny63malies]

Lemme guess, you have one of those yellow chick bators with the clear plastic dome. You can get 5 banty eggs in there and three if you are lucky four regular hen eggs. You can consider yourself lucky if you get a chick at all out of this. It doesnt matter what three egg bator, if you ship eggs , its hard on them and then having only three eggs lowers your chance even more getting a chick to hatch. Try to find a local who can give you eggs or get a bator thats a little bit bigger or make one.

 

[tiki244]

try making an incubator out of styrofoam cooler(Miss Prissy has good instructions and others),,,its cheap and well, kinda easy,,,,,the highest cost is the thermometer/hygrometer (I have accurite) and I would suggest you buy a wafer thermostat ( I first used a water heater thermostat with poor luck),,,,,well Im not too handy so mine isnt too pretty but it works

 

[Nugget]

Hi Connie, no it's not the incubator you're thinking of. My husband bought me a 3-egg R-com mini digital incubator for my birthday. It's small, but it is a good one, and we just hatched 2 (out of 2) of our own gold laced wyandotte eggs last weekend out of it.

Are people generally happy with something like an 80% hatch rate?

We only want 6 hens and since starting with chickens in September have kept getting males as our day old chicks (they are supposed to be straight run... but I'm not so sure). Considering we should expect 50% females from unsexed EGGS we figured if we hatched 3 or so odds say there should be a female in there. This is why we're working on a small scale. I fear exhausting takers for our extras (ie cockerels).

 

[Nugget]

Oh Tiki, we tried making an incubator not long ago and couldn 't for the life of us find a water heater that would register less than 110F. What is a wafer thermostat?

 

[speckledhen]

A wafer is an ether filled disc that fits into a switch to sense changes in temp.

 

[tiki244]

go to Cutlers Pheasant Supplies on line to buy its about 17$ I think and comes in 2-3 days

 

[SundownWaterfowl]

I would be happy with a 90% hatch rate.

 

[tiki244]

Quote:

Did I miss something? 90%?

My first 2 times was 0% with a homemade incibator, my third time was 30% and 4th time was 65% so things are looking up--I use the dry hatch method

I was happy with 30% and more happy with 65%

 

[bearcat73]

Do you count the non-fertilized eggs when figuring hatch rate?