Five major functions are involved in the incubation and hatching of game bird and chicken eggs. The five functions are temperature, humidity, ventilation, egg turning, and sanitation.

The major topics below are explained in detail in the text.

• Hatching Temperature
• Humidity in Incubators and Hatchers
• Ventilation
• Egg Turning
• Hatchery Sanitation

Each of the five functions is important and may individually cause havoc in your attempt to hatch eggs if one is not conducted properly. When two or more are not controlled, it may be a disaster. Keep in mind, that changing or adjusting one of these functions may affect other functions and cause them to need adjustment as well. Therefore, changes in any one function should be made gradually and all functions should be watched closely for needed readjustment.

HATCHING TEMPERATURE

Most of the large commercial type incubators and hatchers are run at 99oF. On the other hand, most of the smaller incubators and hatchers, like those commonly used by game bird producers, are run at 100oF.

Temperature is the easiest hatching function to regulate, provided you have a good set of controls to work with and provided you check the heating mechanism regularly. Without good, sensitive, easy-to-regulate, and dependable temperature controls, you can have low hatches, poor quality chicks, and you can sometimes lose the entire hatch. If your incubators and hatches are large enough to justify doing so, you should install a temperature sensitive alarm to warn you of the potential danger to the developing embryos.

Temperature alarms are usually constructed of two temperature sensors. One is set to activate the alarm if the temperature drops below 97 or 98oF. The other sensor is set to activate the alarm if the temperature goes above 102oF. This is a simple explanation of the temperature alarm and how it is installed, but even so, it is not all that difficult to install. If the machines are not in your home but are nearby, you may want to run a small wire (like speaker wire) from the machines to an alarm in your house so that you can monitor the machines at night also.

* For Forced-air incubators. Add 2-3oF. to the recommended temperatures if using a still-air incubator.

* For Forced-air incubators. Add 2-3oF. to the recommended temperatures if using a still-air incubator.

Temperature fluctuations for short periods of time usually do not severely affect hatchability or chick quality because the temperature inside the egg changes more slowly than the air inside the incubator. However, a consistently low temperature will result in a late hatch and decreased hatchability. The chicks may be large, soft bodied, and weak.

A consistently high temperature will result in an early hatch and decreased hatchability. The chicks may have short down (same results with low humidity) and have rough navels (not necessarily infected -- just abnormal closure). More chicks will be malformed, spraddled, weak, and small.

You do not want either, but if you have to choose one or the other, remember that high temperature is more harmful than low temperature. You can incubate eggs for three or four hours at 90oF. without killing many embryos, but a temperature of 105oF. for 30 minutes will kill many embryos. In general, the older the embryo at the time of the high temperature mishap, the greater the death loss.

Incubators can easily overheat when kept where the sun can hit them, such as in a hot, room on the west of the house or in a small building that is subject to heating up considerably during hot summer afternoons. Machines in such conditions, when set near full capacity and with improper ventilation will almost surely overheat. This statement does not imply that the incubator should not be set to full capacity; on the contrary, other factors must be considered and corrected before you can take full advantage of the incubator's capabilities.

HUMIDITY IN THE INCUBATOR AND HATCHER

Most people think the wet bulb reading in a hatcher or incubator is percent relative humidity. This is, of course, not true. Percent relative humidity is determined by using both dry bulb and wet bulb readings. For example, if the dry bulb reading is 100oF. and the wet bulb reading is 87.3oF., the relative humidity is 60 percent. Under normal conditions the relative humidity in an incubator or hatcher should always be 57 to 60 percent. The following table gives the percent relative humidity figures for various dry and wet bulb readings.

Wet Bulb Temperatures for Relative Humidities
	Dry Bulb Temperature, oF.
Rel. Humidity	99o	100o	101o	102o
oF., Wet Bulb Temperatures
45%	80.5	81.3	82.2	83.0
50%	82.5	83.3	84.2	85.0
55%	84.5	85.3	86.2	87.0
60%	86.5	87.3	88.2	89.0
65%	88.0	89.0	90.0	BORDER-RIGHT: #ece9d8; PADDING Akrum Hamdy [email protected] 01006376836 Currently 75/5 Stars. 1 2 3 4 5 25 تصويتات / 354 مشاهدة نشرت فى 18 يوليو 2008 بواسطة AkrumHamdy احفظ أ.د/ أكـــرم زيـن العــابديــن محـــمود محمـــد حمــدى - جامعــة المنــيا [email protected] [01006376836] Minia University, Egypt » أقسام الموقع موضوعات عامة فسيولوجى My CV الأسماك مراجعات و امتحانات جودة التعليم Immunity المناعة Physiology Educational Programs ابحث تسجيل الدخول اسم الدخول كلمة المرور » غير مشترك؟ احصل على موقع مجاني الآن! » هل نسيت كلمة المرور؟ عدد زيارات الموقع 1,789,901 Akrum Hamdy