These ideas are not my ideas they have been taken from message boards or copied from mail I received. THANK YOU for the use of them Peacockman !!
Humidity has a very important role in having a good hatch. Just stop and think what is the humidity in the room your incubator is in or do you know ??
I use an digital Hygrometer and thermometer one from Radio Stack in the room and one in the incubator. I also use a wet bulb to double check the humidity. The wet bulb reading is from 83 to 86 this is what most incubator co. give on the instruction sheet. If you have a wet bulb reading of 86 and 99.5 degree temperature the humidity is 58.97 relative humidity.
Also all incubator Co. instructions read to keep water in the incubator at all times. Again stop and think if the air where your incubator is has lets say 65% to 70 % relative humidity. Your incubator is drawing this 70% humidity into the incubator over the water pan it will pick up more moisture and circulate over the eggs. You could end up with 80% or more humidity.
What I did was remove the water pan if the Relative Humidity is 60% or over in the room. If the room humidity is 50% or less relative humidity I put the water pan back in. Be sure to check the digital Hygrometer because by removing the water pan I cannot have a wet bulb reading. This worked ok but I wanted to try something different. I built a climate controled Incubating room I control the temperature and humidity. The tempature has only 6 degree difference this does not put a strain on the waffers I use old incubators with waffer thermostats turn by hand except one incubator a Petersine incubator it is automatic turning and electronic thermostats but 30 + years old.
Back to controlling the tempature in a incubator lets say you have your incubator in a garage the tempature can fluctuate 10-20- possable as much as 30 degrees in a 24 hour period. I think it would be hard for a waffer Thermostate to keep up with the differences in tempature. It is best to keep your incubator in a room that has very little change in the tempature. Don't put your incubator in a laundry room or in a room where there is a lot of moisture. I have a dehumidifer in my incubator room I lower the Relative Humidity to 28% keep the water pans in all of the time. I cover the water pan until I get the digital reading I want and also wet bulb reading. Air conditioner keeps the temp at 78 to 82 degrees I set the waffer thermostats at 99.5 degrees and this is the way I hatch out over 400 Pea chicks and 300 + chicken chicks.
Another very important part of hatching is to be sure you are useing the correct wet bulb reading. The Psychrometric incubation table incubator companies send with the incubator is for sea level. Dr Jim Clary in New Mexico found that the table was calluated by person unknowed in the mid to late 18th century or early 19th century. The origonal table that was use had a foot note that for ever 500 feet eleveation there is a different table reading. Dr Jim and a friend worked a long time to figure out the different tables from sea level to 7,500 feet If you use these readings effects from a low pressure weather front will not be negligible. DR Jim sells this different readings in a book form. I use the table for 1,00 feet elevation Now on Temperature in the incubator If it is low the eggs will hatch late if it is too high the eggs will hatch early. Bantam eggs will hatch early some times with the 99.5 Temperature setting.
A clean incubator clean fertile eggs not over 7 days old and tender loving care can produce a good hatch. I do not increase the humidity the last 3 days a broody hen does not increase the humidity the last three days that I know of. Hope this might be of some help if not thanks for reading it. Enjoy your Poultry.
Peacockman ROCK-N'-CEDAR Muldrow, Okla.
