Posted by:
lavenderalbino
at Mon Jun 30 12:17:33 2008 [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by lavenderalbino ]
Tough luck on the eggs. It is hard to know what happened with this clutch, but I would offer the following comments.
Any temp between 86 and 90 is acceptable and fluctiations within that range are generally not a problem. The farther you get outside of that range (and the earlier in the cycle) the more likely you are to have problems. Eggs will generally tolerate cooler temps better than excessively higher temps - especially for extended periods of time, but having said that I have heard that some of the "farms" incubate eggs at at temps up to around 92 degrees). I do not put the thermostat probe or temp monitoring probe inside my egg boxes and incubate at an inside the incubator temperature 89 degrees. During the last couple of weeks eggs actually give off heat as a by product of "respiration" and temps inside the egg box will be a degree or two higher that outside. This is why you start seeing some condensate on the inside walls of an uninsulated egg box starting at this time. For this reason putting the thermostat probe inside a single egg box in an incubator holding several clutches at varying stages of incubation can result in unintended temperature fluctuations for the other clutches.
One further comment. You mentioned that you were using the no substrate method. Nothing wrong with this method, I have tried it and have used it successfuly - although I have gone back to a traditiona substrate method. When using this method there are a couple of things you need to be mindful of. First you need to make sure that the eggs are not resting against the wall of the egg box. Otherwise if condensation does occur it will run down on the egg and potentially drown it. Also, you do need to make sure that the eggs cannot inadvertently "roll around". If an egg happens to roll 180 degrees in the course of moving or checking the eggs after incubation has begun, it will most often cause the egg to die. I am not sure any of these comments have relevance to your particular situation, but I thought they may possibly be helpful. Good luck!
Grant
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RE: Probe placement in EGG container? - lavenderalbino, Mon Jun 30 12:17:33 2008
