I hope I didn’t forget anything important. There, I believe that is all I know about incubators. If you are using a unit with a fan, you will want to watch your water levels a bit more closely because of evaporation. This can be accomplished by simply opening a hole in the incubator. This will keep fresh air in the incubator and help promote embryo growth. You want a little air flow through the incubator. If one of your kids comes home infected with Typhus or the Black Plague, keep the little walking petri dish of death away from the incubator. Wash your eggs in warm water before placing them in the incubator. My question to all of these well meaning people is: Have you ever been in a chicken coop? Have you ever seen the condition of chicken eggs in their natural state? Regardless of how “sterile” you try to keep your coop or nests, those little T-Rexes are going to poop on anything that doesn’t move. One place actually suggested using rubber or latex gloves. They say that I should make sure to wash my hands in anti-bacterial soap before handling the eggs. Several places I use for resources have stated that the embryos are very susceptible to bacterial infection. All of this is to keep from developing one incredible funk in your incubator. Remove the hatched chicks as soon as they are dry. You will want to periodically check the temperature just to be on the safe side. Once the chicks have hatched you will want to remove the discarded shells. Make sure you have water in your reservoir. Sanitation and maintenance of your incubator: This, I presume, is to prevent the little blighters from getting hung up in the turner. It is recommended that about 3 days prior to hatching, you should remove the egg turner and allow the eggs to rest on the bottom of the incubator. I’m not sure if I’ll be doing any candling of the eggs, but if I do I will be taking pictures of the results. So, in roughly 21 days we should be seeing signs of life. I’m hoping this egg produces my first step in retrofitting chickens into dinosaurs. I loaded 11 eggs on the 1st of May, 11 on the 2nd of May and 1 freakishly large and deformed egg on the 3rd. The reason you rotate the eggs is so that the yolk and embryo don’t get stuck to one side of the egg. Eggs should be rotated 2 to 3 times per day. This way you will know what side should be up. If you are going to turn your eggs by hand I recommend using a pencil to place an X on one side of the egg and an O on the other. You can do it by hand, but unless you are completely vigilant, you will fail and end up with slow cooked rotten eggs. The Little Giant has reservoir canals built into the bottom of the incubator.Īn egg turner is a must. So, you will want to make sure that you have some type of water reservoir in the incubator. The hen will take water and bill it into the feathers of her underside. Humidity is also very important to a successful hatch rate. You also want to make sure that your incubator is in a fairly draft free area. 50 – 55 degrees Fahrenheit (10 – 12.78 Celsius) is preferable for storage. Eggs can be stored in a cool area until you are ready to begin incubating. Once you have established a steady temperature it is time to start gathering your eggs. 99.5 degrees Fahrenheit (37.5 degrees Celsius) is a nice temperature for chicken eggs. You want to run it for about 4 to 6 hours prior to actually placing any eggs in it. When setting up an incubator, homemade or store bought, it is always best to test it out and make sure that it can maintain a steady temperature. I can not speak highly enough about Little Giant. I went from having a lot of slow cooked rotten eggs to a pretty decent hatch rate. However, I didn’t see any real success until I purchased a Little Giant. I’ve attempted to make my own incubators in my past incarnation as a micro farm owner, Lake Lodge Micro Farm. The people at Miller Manufacturing Company make some very nice products. We have a Little Giant Model 9200 Still Air Incubator along with the Model 6300 Automatic Egg Turner. As of May 1st we started loading up the incubator.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |