Nov 1st, 2009 by GardeningVet
When we went on holidays, we had a disaster in our chicken coop/run. I had a friend who was living nearby chicken-sit for us and because she only came around once a day to collect mail and eggs and care for the chickens, I thought I would make it easier for her by relieving her the task of having to lock them in at night so the coop door was open but the chickens were in the run. They coped okay for a week in that set up but I got a frantic call from her in our second week of holidays saying that she arrived to feathers in the run and no sign of the chickens. I suspected the worse. When we finally got home, we found that something had dug under the run fence and gotten into the run and left just feathers, no body parts, no chickens. Needless to say we were devastated. So after a whole 3 weeks of no chickens – I must say the backyard looked decidedly forlorn with no bwok-bwoks around. We finally succumbed and I decided to set more eggs again in the homemade incubator and start afresh. I cut up the expresspost bag to line the bottom of the foam incubator and will put in non-slip drawer lining when I stop turning – hopefully that will make clean up time after hatching a breeze. Here they are now :
chicken eggs in the homemade incubator
After 2 days incubating, I had a friend’s dad who was asking if I could help him incubate some of his King Quail eggs (some call them button quail) – his hen had been laying great guns but just refused to sit on them. Unfortunately I think the bulk of the eggs he gave me (14 in total) would be a tad ‘old’ to be setting but I popped them in the incubator anyway because I had the space. Hopefully some of them will hatch. I believe quails take a shorter time to hatch than chickens so hopefully if I’ve timed it right, they will all hatch together.
King Quail eggs in the incubator
Tags: Chickens, Homemade Incubator
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Oct 31st, 2009 by GardeningVet
Cute frizzle chickens
I never used to think much about chickens. In fact I don’t think I thought much about them at all. I was more used to the fluffy cuddly type pets like dogs and cats and bunnies. Having said that, since I’ve embarked on a suburban sustainability and a ‘tread lightly’ on this earth journey, it would appear that if you are even remotely trying to start an organic/permaculture type garden, then chickens are a must-have in the backyard. Thus started our chicken adventure and to be honest, they have grown on me and I really like them. They have funny little personalities and keep me company when I’m gardening.
Tags: Chickens
Posted in Chickens, Keeping backyard chickens | No Comments »
Jun 30th, 2009 by GardeningVet
After the first taste of success with the styrofoam homemade incubator I decided that I needed (or wanted) to take it to another level of sophistication. I read online that aquarium shops often stock larger styrofoam boxes that had thicker walls. The last homemade incubator was made from your run of the mill brocolli box from the greengrocers which was okay but I thought with thicker walls I would have better insulation. I toyed with the idea of using an old esky but there weren’t that many lying around so I went with the aquarium shop idea.
Here’s the difference in size
I also resolved to have a bigger viewing window (therefore a bigger lid was required) and also one that was double glazed to prevent the condensation problem that you get when you increase humidity in the last few days. I went to my local Reject Shop and bought 2 document frames, took out the bits apart. I cut a hole in the styrofoam box lid and stuck the glass pane down on either side of the lid, then did the same with the black frame. I found that the backing board fitted the front of the frame and attached it so that it acted as a ‘door’ to open up the viewing window.
Lid closed
Lid open
Then I started work on the insides. I wanted a 2 chamber incubator where 1 side was the egg chamber and the other was the one with the heat source and water to maintain humidity. Using the old styrofoam incubator wall I cut out a section of it so that it would fit snugly inside the new styrofoam box. I also cut out a hole for the computer fan and 2 holes on the bottom fitted with circular plastic vent snap ons (I think they were supposed to be for cupboard vents).
The idea was that the fan would suck air out of the top of the egg chamber, into the heating/humidity chamber and then out through the vent holes on the bottom. I slid the wall in and then caulked with silicon along the sides to ensure a snug fit.
Although the fan is really too high for any scalping of chicks to occur, I still wanted to play safe, so I cut out a bit of plastic gutter guard and covered the fan on the egg chamber side by attaching it to the fan with screws.
Realizing that the incandescent bulb is on its way out production wise, I was keen to trial halogen lamps. Bought one from Bunnings and attached it (50W) – I was concerned that it would melt the styrofoam because it’s so much shorter than your conventional bulb fitting, so I put the metal lid of a soup can on the back to prevent any direct heat hitting the styrofoam. I was a bit disappointed because I found that the single 50W halogen was insufficient to provide heat – I tested it – so I decided to just throw in an incandescent on the side to provide additional heat (40W) and it worked well.
I wanted to ensure that the airflow was working and so I stuck 2 strips of tissue paper on the vents and turned on the fan. The last thing I did was to cut 2 holes on the side walls – 1 into the egg chamber to allow me to turn the eggs and to fish chicks out when they hatched, the other in the heating/water chamber to allow me to add more dishes of water or to fill up water trays as needed. I also cut 2 holes on the top wall directly opposite the fan in the egg chamber to allow for air exchange. Then I plugged in the old thermostat that I had to the 2 lights, slipped the sensor into the egg chamber, plugged in the fan and ran it for a day with a couple of thermometers in there to check that temperatures were stable.
I tested it on some quail eggs I ordered over the mail and hatched them on day 17 – if you look carefully you can see the strips of tissue I attached to check air flow.
What I like about this incubator compared to the first one :
The side hatch doors – the last incubator only had 1 access point ie the lid on the top, everytime I opened it, all the hot air would escape (hot air rises) – eg when you want to take a chick out whilst the others are still hatching. The side hatches ensured that very little of this happens and temperatures within the egg chamber stayed stable
The 2 compartments and air flow ensured a more even flow of heat throughout the chamber – I tested it with different thermometers throughout the chamber and the variation was less than 0.5C. That could account for the tighter hatch. The first incubator I had chicks hatch over 3 days – this one they all hatched within a day of each other.
The large double paned viewing window – I had very little condensation – which was perfect during hatch time when the last thing you want is a fogged up window when all the action is happening!
What I would change:
With the quail eggs, it really takes up a lot less room and with the large egg chamber I find that I’m heating alot of air so perhaps a smaller more compact version could be made – problem I have is that styrofoam boxes come in standard sizes and you don’t have much of a choice there
Maybe some sort of semi-auto turner. Currently with the side hatch, I can just open it and run my hand over the eggs to turn them. Ideally I guess I could devise some sort of egg rocker type thing similar to what the Hovabators have. Definitely something to think about.
Tags: Homemade Incubator
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