80% fertility so far

Well I jumped into my first incubation experience 10 days ago and put 21 Khaki Campbell eggs in an incubator I overhauled. It was an old insect culture incubator that had a box too small to hold an egg turner, so I hauled all the hardware out and made a new styrofoam box then installed the heating element, thermostat and added a computer fan to circulate the air.

Last night I made a box to use for candling the eggs and had a first look (at 9 days in the incubator). Wow!

Although I've never seen any of my ducks mating (not sure if the drakes were old enough) 19 of the 21 eggs were fertilized at some point. Two had died earlier (only blood smears showing). The other 17 (80%) had nice development of blood vessels and active embryos moving inside.

Now I just have to wait for 2 1/2 weeks (sheesh!) to see what happens. I've been reading that some people sprinkle the eggs with water during the incubation but not sure if that is best.

Any thoughts or experience with spraying / sprinkling eggs during incubation?

Thanks

I seem to get good luck not sprinkling or regular cool downs but other people swear by it.
Are you turning your eggs a few times a day?
This is something you absolutely cannot over look.

Yes, they're in an automatic turner so are being turned every 2 hours.

We had a big wind storm on Sunday night and lost power for about 8 hours. The incubator temperature was down to 68 degrees by morning. I just left evrything as is and waited for the power to return. I checked one egg Monday night and the embryo was still moving around, so hopefully they will all make it through this hiccup okay. I presume I'll need to add some missing "penalty" time to my expected hatch date, or will they catch up, given a short delay?

Anyone had expereinces recovering from power failures during incubation?

Hi,

I took the remaining 15 eggs out of the turner this morning (at the end of day 25 of incubation) and 1 egg had pipped by 6pm. This seems early to be pipping with three days still to go (or is it?).

The really wild thing is to see the egs start to wiggle when you're talking in the room. Even at this stage they are reacting to sounds near them. No need to candle the eggs at this stage to see if the embryos are still alive!

Yes its so cute when they talk to you isn't it?

I've had the power go off and eggs went all night with no heat and they hatched out fine.

Of the 15 fertile eggs, 10 hatched on March 12th and 13th. There are 5 purebred Khaki Campbells and 5 Campbell crosses.

All are eating and drinking well and running around the brooder. A couple seemed to have spraddled legs shortly after hatching but seem fine now.