What is your true Hatch success rate?

[SliderShooter]

Dragons, I respectfully disagree, your hatch rate is less than 68%. The reason the egg doesn't hatch has nothing to do with the hatch rate. If you set the egg in the incubator, it must be included in the calculations. Unless there is a special new math used for determining hatch rates that I am unaware of.

The hatching process begins when the hen lays the egg.

Here's the bigger question: why do you think only 11 of the 16 hatched? We know why the clears didn't hatch. Why did the other 5 die in the shell?

I am experiencing the same issue with my hatches. About 50% don't hatch, and of that 50%, half are clears and the other half failed at some point in the incubation process, most at the end, when the chick is fully developed but dead in the shell.

I am not happy with a 50% hatch rate. But if I throw out the clears that would increase my hatch rate to 75%. Big difference in the hatch rate but I still have to consider the eggs that didn't hatch regardless of the reason.

I think I have a problem somewhere and I am just just trying to figure out where it is.

 

[Dragons4u]

I don't count the complete clears, ie, not fertilized. These were shipped eggs that were not treated well in shipping. So remove the five clears that were not fertilized, not fertilized means never can develop, only useful in determining if you breeders are doing well or not.
The other five were two blood rings, one deformed late stage quitter, and two internal pip deaths. Of those that hatched and survived two of them were also deformed but survived reasonably well. Person I got the eggs from said those deformities occurred occasionally in the eggs that breeding group laid that month and so they were "retired."

 

[Dragons4u]

You can't count the clears in determining your hatch rate because you don't know how many were fertilized to start with. The larger the batch of eggs you set, the greater the chance you will have some non fertilized eggs, which never will develop and can't tell you if you are doing anything right or wrong.
Most people feel that 50 percent or higher hatch rate on shipped eggs is pretty good. My first hatch, I incubated them differently than the shipper said to, and got a higher hatch rate than he himself did...even counting the clears.
He now incubated his eggs the same way I did and is seeing 90 percent or higher hatch rate on his home eggs.

 

[tbryan]

I would think you would want to count the clears even though its not necessarily the incubator or hatching processes fault, the infertility is an issue that still needs to be addressed if you are striving for improvement. This is even more true if you are purchasing eggs to hatch, if you are shopping for hatching eggs and the seller of some you want brags of a 95% hatch rate, that number is useless to you if the seller doesnt included the clears in his number,you really have no clue as to the quality of those eggs.

 

[SliderShooter]

The logic used in not counting infertile eggs to determine hatch rates escapes me. To each his own I guess.

 

[Biscuit Bunch]

My husband and I decided to let one of our hens sit on eggs as we had 4 hens get killed by the neighbor dog. We have three coops and put one hen and one rooster together and let them do their thing. After about three weeks our hen was sitting on seventeen (17) eggs. We knew that the rooster was taking care of business so we were hoping for a large turn out with at least eight to ten eggs to hatch. Over this past weekend, we received a special gift as all seventeen hens hatched. Excited that we had 100% hatch rate. We have been reading on the forum and unless we missed it, we didn't see others with 100% hatch rate. We are not sure of the sex of the chicks yet but with previous experience we think we have possibly eleven girls.

 

[BobDBirdDog]

The logic used in not counting infertile eggs to determine hatch rates escapes me. To each his own I guess.

Respectfully, I side with Dragons on this topic as the egg is only the product of ovulation.
Consider a Woman, after all they produce eggs as well.

If a condom is used during sex and the woman ovulates (produces an egg), do we consider the woman pregnant, expecting or the whole affair an abortion? No! The ovulation occurred but there was no fertilization of the egg within her. She may incubate the egg inside for however long......but she is never pregnant.

Also, under the assumption that we consider every egg in our hatch rate, that would be like considering every womans ovulation cycle in the mortality rate of unborn children. Roughly, that would mean that society would have to rethink how many still births or children die each year multiplied by 12 (12 female periods/ cycles).

From the Guy standpoint of fertility.
Consider a guy is has fertility issues and tries to get a woman pregnant but cant! Do we consider the woman pregnant or do we see it as the man and woman are attempting to procreate resulting in many pleasurable but unsuccessful attempts.

in unrelated example, it would be like considering a forest fire of trees burning down to the stump (the number of trees) , with the calculated total of house fires each year.

Just my view.

 

[BobDBirdDog]

My husband and I decided to let one of our hens sit on eggs as we had 4 hens get killed by the neighbor dog. We have three coops and put one hen and one rooster together and let them do their thing. After about three weeks our hen was sitting on seventeen (17) eggs. We knew that the rooster was taking care of business so we were hoping for a large turn out with at least eight to ten eggs to hatch. Over this past weekend, we received a special gift as all seventeen hens hatched. Excited that we had 100% hatch rate. We have been reading on the forum and unless we missed it, we didn't see others with 100% hatch rate. We are not sure of the sex of the chicks yet but with previous experience we think we have possibly eleven girls.

Congrats on the success rate, that roo and hen did its job well!
Not to steal your thunder though, I created this topic based on the human incubation in an artificial setting. Still that is a good rate in the natural light of things.

 

[James the Bald]

Dragons, I respectfully disagree, your hatch rate is less than 68%. The reason the egg doesn't hatch has nothing to do with the hatch rate. If you set the egg in the incubator, it must be included in the calculations. Unless there is a special new math used for determining hatch rates that I am unaware of.

The hatching process begins when the hen lays the egg.

Here's the bigger question: why do you think only 11 of the 16 hatched? We know why the clears didn't hatch. Why did the other 5 die in the shell?

I am experiencing the same issue with my hatches. About 50% don't hatch, and of that 50%, half are clears and the other half failed at some point in the incubation process, most at the end, when the chick is fully developed but dead in the shell.

I am not happy with a 50% hatch rate. But if I throw out the clears that would increase my hatch rate to 75%. Big difference in the hatch rate but I still have to consider the eggs that didn't hatch regardless of the reason.

I think I have a problem somewhere and I am just just trying to figure out where it is.

I agree with this. My very first hatch, I set 18 eggs. On lockdown, I candled all of the eggs and 2 were fertile, the rest were clear, eventually hatching those 2 eggs. Going by everyone elses "definition", I had a 100% hatch rate. By my standards, I had a 9% hatch rate. If you set two eggs, and one doesn't hatch because it's infertile, regardless of the circumstances, each egg set should count (#set / #hatch = hatch rate). Otherwise, you're just skewing your data to boost your hatch rate.

So, imagine you play the lottery every week... you buy one ticket and play the same numbers for 52 weeks. On the 52nd week you hit the jackpot. Does that give you a 100% success rate?????
James

 

[tobit]

I have my Banty on 6 eggs right now, set to hatch Thursday or Friday, all are looking fertile so I'll let you know how many hatch!