Randy, it might not be anything at all that you did. If the embryos were developing up until the 18th day and then died it was most likely a deficiency of vitamin B-12 in the hen's diet that caused it. But there is no excuse for not monitoring the humidity in an incubator. Digital hygrometer/thermometers are cheap and work well. 50% humidity is too low. It should be 60% until the last 3 days when it should be raised somewhat. The low temp might or might not be significant. It depends on how long it was at 97 degrees. An hour or even two probably would have little to no affect.
Eric
--- In CHICKENS-101@yahoogroups.com, "logcabin97023" <Logcabinrandy@...> wrote:
>
> This is another question that pertains to my new post on Iowa Blues. I ordered 12 hatching eggs off of ebay. Only two hatched. I just went out and broke open the other 10 eggs and 8 had babies that were close to being fully formed. I have a hovabator forced air unit, automatic egg turner. As I live in the Northwest I did not add any water in the unit for humidity. During the incubation time our outside humidity was always around 50%. When I removed the eggs from the turner and placed them on the wire mesh I added water to bring up the humidity per what I had read I should do. I do not have any device to measure humidity. Also one day near the end I noticed that my incubator temp had fallen down to 97 degrees while I was at work.
>
> What do you think I did wrong here? Too much humidity or did that day of lower temp do me in? I'm leaning towards too much humidity. What a disappointment to see so many chicks nearly formed and then have them not hatch
>
> Thanks,
> Randy
>
CHICKENS-101@yahoogroups.com
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