what is lockdown?

[DANNY]

Lockdown is very over rated. The bottom line is I have always opened my incubator when I need to. For instance I check after several have hatched and make sure that none are in trouble like having a shell caped over them or getting a leg out the pip because things like this can and does happen. The biggest thing I do is take a small spray bottle (that I keep warm in the bator) and spritz the eggs good before I shut it back up to replace lost humidity. I hatch over 1000 birds last year.

 

[Baralak]

Quote:
Danny.. To be honest, I used to live next to a hatchery in Joaquin, Texas... They hatched Thousands and that is were I got my first taste of incubation. (of course these were huge compaired to my brisnea) They didn't even have water hooked up to the place, nor did they ever use the term lockdown.. I believe that it, in our use, it the time that we remove our turners (for those that remove turners) bring up the RH, and Leave them alone. I remove each of my chicks after they dry off, I move eggs around so that I can get a better look angle. But I think the term comes more for a physcological aspect than physcial.

As long as you can control the RH, the Temp and your bator has a good recovery time. For some of these bators out there, not to mention any other brand.. I would not advise opening because of the recovery time for the Humidity and temp.

my 2 cents

 

[DANNY]

I am not saying people shoudn't do it but I have been hatching birds for 40 years and found that like you say as long as the RH and temperature is regained in a timely manor it does'nt matter if you open the bator or not. I use my daughters Barbie doll spritzer and keep it in the bator so it's the same temperature as the eggs to replace the RH and the temp comes back up fine.

 

[dak]

Quote:
DANNY, this sound more sensible to me than the crowd that believes you kill your whole hatch if you lift the lid during lockdown. Let me run this by you...at day 18 my airsacs seemed too small to me so I left them in the incubator at the regular humidity, but stopped turning them. Today is day 20. I checked this morning and there was no internal pipping yet, but good movement. Any thoughts on not moving them to the hacther with its higher humidity til I see internal pipping??? dak