incubating/hatching

[Alhoy 0]

am looking for advice on books /literature on incubating /hatching of pheasant eggs....any constructive advice welcomed...

[Guest The Big Fish]

What do ya wanna know?

[Alhoy 0]

What do ya wanna know?

am looking for books ..info really..had a disaster this year.most of eggs had chicks inside fully ready to chip out..but only a few managed to break out...the rest seem to have not been able to break out..didnt seem to have energy/strength.??

followed the instruction manual..but some where, somehow things went amiss... so looking to read up for next year...

 

 

cheers Alan

[Guest The Big Fish]

A common problem Alhoy, the reason the chicks couldnt break out was probably due to the fact that the humidity was too high during incubation, this causes the growing chick to become too big in its shell.

 

K i will try to explain things.

 

Humidity during incubation should be around 30%, this then allows a certain amount of evaporation of the egg contents throughout the incubation period. If there is too much humidity, then not enough evaporation occurs and hence the chicks will be too big. On that same note, if the humidity is too low, then the chicks will be too small and most probably either die in the shell or be very weak sickly chicks.

 

When hatching begins (with most game birds, the last 3 days of the incubation period), the humidity is raised to 40%, this allows lubrication inside the shell and allows the chick to move without sticking to the shell wall, again if the humidity is too low, the chick will stick to the shell wall and not be able to hatch properly.

 

Note: when hatching is taking place, turning of the eggs ceases.

 

Temprature remains the same throughout incubation and hatching and is a constant 37.5 C throughout the egg, or if a still air incubator is being used, it will be 39 C at the top of the egg (note: still air hatchers have the eggs laid on thier sides, so 39 C at the highest part of the egg wall, this will then produce a temp of 37.5 at the center of the egg)

 

Temp plays an important part, if the temp is too high, the chicks will be small and hatch too early, again if the temp is too low, the chicks will be big and hatch too late or die.

 

There are some fairly good books on the subject, but if you have any other questions then just fire away

[OldTrapCollector 376]

Great reply Big Fish , I wouldn't have remembered that much myself, plus I always used Western incubators with moving air systems. I would have said that the humidity might have been too low at the hatching stage, where I would have removed the trays to the hatcher.

 

OTC

[Guest The Big Fish]

Yes OTC there it is definatley a humidity problem of some sort, imo.

Difficult to tell at what stage the problem occurs, without actually doing the hatching myself.

 

I know of a few keepers that dont realy care a less how the hatch goes and just slap cold water into the trays and hope for the best. I doubt they get a good hatch percentage though

[OldTrapCollector 376]

I know of a few keepers that dont realy care a less how the hatch goes and just slap cold water into the trays and hope for the best. I doubt they get a good hatch percentage though

 

Those type of people really don't meet with the job description of 'game-keepers' IMO, they are just glorified free-range chicken farmers.

 

OTC