A Guide to Practical Breeding A Guide to Practical Breeding First edition, 2012 | Page 38
38
- discard thin or cracked shells, .
- do not wipe the eggs before incubation,
- reject dirty eggs.
Proper care is necessary and important. Gathering your eggs on a
regular daily basis is advised, even twice or three times a day especially
during hot days. Keep the eggs in cool dark place, with humidity not less
than 70%.
The two most common types of incubators are still air and forced
air. The smaller of the two is the still air incubator and it has no fan for
air circulation. The larger and better type incubator is the forced air style
that includes a fan to circulate the air inside. When using the forced air
incubator the recommended temperature is 100 degrees F . If this temperature is not followed or rises and lowers during the incubation period,
chances are the eggs will be ruined and will not hatch. The improper temperature is the most common cause of poor hatching. The other common
reasons are poor sanitation, lack of proper ventilation and neglectful egg
turning.
The still air incubator requires an internal temperature of 102 degrees F for good hatching conditions.
The control of the humidity is also important during the incubation process, and is an extremely important factor in the eggs development. Should the humidity be too high or too low, proper development of
the embryo is not possible and will result in poor hatching.
In addition to temperature and humidity, another important factor
is oxygen supply. Proper amounts of oxygen for the embryo's growth and
development is necessary. Still another factor for good hatching is the
turning of the eggs. In the still air incubator, this is
done manually and requires eggs to be turned three
to five times a day. In an automatic incubator, this is
done automatically, but still requires monitoring.
After 18 days in the setter, the eggs are transferred to the hatchers and no turning is done anymore.
Hen brooding is a better method
than artificial brooding.
Incubation and brooding
At RB Sugbo, incubation is either by natural
or artificial. Mostly by artificial method of setting
and hatching egg