does anyone have plans for a home-made incubator?

-- julie (jbritt@ceva.net), February 10, 2002

Answers

cyborganic.com/People/feathersite/Poultry/IncBurgoon.html .do a search on google.com there are quit a few listed there.There is also plans for one in the book "raising poultry the modern way".Dave

-- Dave (duckthis1@maqs.net), February 10, 2002.

julie, I did see a discussion about this just down the road apiece, don't remember what date though, sorry. Scroll down, can't remember either what was discovered. If I only had a brain! LOL Just no memory left in it. Durn! LOL LQ

-- Little Quacker (carouselxing@juno.com), February 10, 2002.

to Little Quacker

Maybe you still have a brain but your disk just needs to be cleaned.

gail

-- gail missouri ozarks (gef@getgoin.net), February 10, 2002.

Quacker, i did look, didn't see it, pardon me. You are like a poultry watchdog...lol

-- julie (jbritt@ceva.net), February 10, 2002.

Julie, you need to scroll down to the poultry section in the archives. Some good plans there, I was impressed and I don't have nerve enough to try incubating. It seems like magic to me! LOL Gail, the only disc cleaner I have is coffee, that probably explains the problem! Too much latte! LOL LQ

-- Little Quacker (carouselxing@juno.com), February 10, 2002.

Hi Julie...I bought an ancient, homemade incubator from my local cooperative extension agency. (for $10.00) They made them for 4H projects years ago. It was very primative. I think the co-op still offers the directions for making one. Basically a 3 sided wooden box, solid bottom, and glass top and front. The back opened, so you could rotate eggs twice a day, and had a shallow pan in the bottom to hold water for moisture. The egg tray came out and had a wire mesh bottom. The heat source was 2/100 watt lightbulbs, that came on and off by using a bimetal disc thermostat inside. It was kind of hard to get it set at 98 degrees and stay there, but once it did it was fine. The humidity level must remain pretty high so the eggs don't dry out. If they do, the chicks have a real hard time pecking their way out. This particular incubator held 30 eggs and the three times I used it I had probably a 90% hatch rate, which is very good. Let me know how it goes. If you can't find the directions anywhere, I'll go to the extension office here and find you the directions. If you have kids, (or even if you don't) it is a wonderful thing to watch the first chick peck it's way out of an egg.

-- Harmony (harmonyfarm57@hotmail.com), February 10, 2002.

Too much coffee L.Q.? So that explains it! I couldn't for the life of me figure out why you didn't tell us all to go to the Poultry Connection!! (Sorry, couldn't resist! You ARE right when you send us there....) There are plans for incubators in the book "The Family Poultry Flock" Edited by Lee Schwanz, A Farmer's Digest Publication. ISBN 0-944079-08-3. I remember my parents using incubators - what fun for kids. I hope to do some hatching this spring myself.

-- Bernie from Northern Ontario (bernadette_kerr@hotmail.com), February 11, 2002.

Julie, I built one from a 20 quart plastic cooler. I got the idea from MSU Extension by typing "Homemade chicken egg incubator" in my Yahoo search bar. I studied it, researched ALOT, and began. I had an old piece of plexiglass lying around and cut a large rectangle out of the top which is a flip lid and laid my plexiglass viewing window there. I bought a wafer thermostat assembly on-line from Randall Burkey (they were cheapest). I used a porcelain light bulb socket and the rod from a lamp kit for the heat source. To make mine a forced air model I had an old 3" computer CPU fan lying around which I mounted inside to circulate the warm air. The platform for the eggs was small, rigid, woven wire. Underneath I placed a small tupperware dish for humidity (experimented with sizes till I got desired humidity %) I had over 75% successful hatch rate my first setting of eggs. This thing works good! Hope this helps if you need more explicit direction let me know.

PoePoe

-- PoePoe (rpd932@yahoo.com), February 11, 2002.

Plans for homemade incubators:

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-- ~Rogo (rogo2222@hotmail.com), February 12, 2002.