Incubators are so great, especially if you have an egg turner. In exactly 21 days, chicks start hatching out. You have to keep the temperature and humidity correct but other than that, it’s a breeze. Just read the information that comes with the incubator.
I have two still air incubators. One is for hatching and the other has the egg turner in it for the first 18 days. You don’t have to have two incubators but I wanted to put eggs into the incubator on various days. If you don’t get many eggs a day, it is nice to have the two incubators.
Be sure and wash your hands before handling the eggs or the newborn chicks. It is best NOT to handle the newborn chicks anymore than necessary.
You collect your eggs and DON’T wash them off if you want to hatch them. You can save them up for a few days…up to ten, I have been told. I don’t save them for more than five to ensure better hatching rate. You need to put them in an egg carton with the fat side up and move them side to side twice a day. What I do is put a book under one side of the egg carton and switch it to the other side and then back again later. I read it keeps the embryo from sticking to the side of the egg shell. Yuk
Then once you have the temperature and humidity correct and it stays that way for at least 24 hours, you are ready to put the eggs in. Again, fat side up. The egg turner does a great job and all you really have to do is check the temperature and humidity a couple times a day. The still air incubator says it should have 99.5 temperature and the humidity should be at 75 per cent. Things I have read say you can have the temp between 99.5 to 102. My incubator did not come with a hygrometer but I bought one at Walmart for less than 10 bucks. It has temp and humidity on it.
After 18 days in the incubator, you need to stop turning the eggs and put them into “lockdown”. This means you lay them down carefully in the incubator and stop moving them. You leave the incubator closed and just add water through the holes on top. It is a good idea to put a sponge right under the hole so you can pour the water onto the sponge. The humidity needs to be higher when they are being hatched so they don’t stick to the white membrane inside the egg.
You can actually hear the baby chicks chirp before they hatch. You will see a small crack in the shell and then the chick will zip (peck) the shell apart and fall out of the shell. You can leave the chick in the incubator for twenty-four hours but I don’t do that. I think the wire rack must be uncomfortable. lol I leave it in the incubator for maybe an hour or if it hatches out overnight, until I get up. Then I put the chick in a box with either a towel or old t-shirts under a heat lamp. You want something absorbent so the chick will dry quickly and you need to keep the chick’s air temperature at about 100 degrees.
Chicks don’t have to eat or drink for three days but I put water and food in immediately. I take a peanut butter lid and put some feed in it with add water to make it a mush. It is easier for the baby chick to eat that way. If I don’t see them drinking, I dip the chick’s beak in the water to show the chick where to drink.
In my neighborhood, you can sell day old straight run chicks for $3 and specialty chicks for more. I have Aracuana/Americana chickens (green egg layers) and Silkies (fluffy hair chickens) and then the black and white chickens (Barred Rock). I told myself I will sell these as day old chicks and make some money but it is so hard to part with chicks. They are so adorable.
Time to go see if the second chick has pecked it’s way out yet.