Discuss all aspects of raising poultry. No topic is too small
Generators?
Small ones. Anyone any experience, please? Asking around sort of left me thinking a 2Kw one would do. Now, I've just read these things may run for a couple of hours, on a fill? Not a lot then?
Leitrim has quite enough, announced, four hour cuts. I'd like to run an incubator :|
Ratcatcher
Monday, September 30th, 2024 The thing to watch is that you get an inverter generator that produces a true sine wave. The cheaper generators produces a square wave that can muck up the control circuits of most modern incubators. If you can find a analog incubator like a hovabator it will be less susceptible.
There are 12v incubators that you can run off a car battery but I have no direct experience of them or you could run a 240v incubator using an inverter off a car battery.
Personaly I go low tech. We have several 8 hour cuts each summer (4 last year). I built a polystyerene box large enough to hold the incubator plus several bottles of blood heat water. This keeps the incubator at an acceptable level and I still get good hatch rates.
Eggs aren't as vulnerable as most people assume to temperature drops, especially during the first and last weeks of incubation, so if you get sufficient warning try to time your incubation to avoid that middle week.
I once hatched an Indian runner egg that had been cold for 2 days when an incubator broke down, the duck sold for £145 at auction.
Glyn
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024 Eggs will last a day or more no problem as long as its not the last few days of hatching dont open the incubator keep what heat is in it.
paddycrawford
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024 Thanks, guys! :)
Glyn; Sine Waves! Yeah! (What witchcraft is This?!) Came across all that. Haven't a Clue. But, I Did pick up that I need the True stuff / one.
Yeah. I'd like the chance to do a bit more than just run the inc', in the dark. While machines do seem to step up by 50watts a time, I'm told a 2000 is where to look. And 'Inverter' too. Yep.
£3 - 500 mark? Doesn't bother me. I'll breed Indian Runners! LMAO! (How did it do That, Glyn?! What do they usually go for? Surely that's Insane money?)
My complete downfall though came when I found we're meant to expect, like, hour and half(?!) off a full tank! *What?!* :o
I think That's the thing I'm really trying to get a lead on here. Real life ~ horror? ~ stories. Maybe of why we don't hear the buzz of gennies, when the lights go out.
Paddy; Ye mention of eggs lasting was a timely reminder that I Must check out the RH requirements of eggs, while they wait to go In the incu'.
I came across all that, earlier this year. Somehow went into a tailspin as I couldn't think how to effect RH, at that point. But, I did realise the dozen MEG Bantam eggs I had were now Dog food. As were countless of their eggs. Not Next year, if I can help it!
Used a poly box, for my frog, Cerberus, before. Good luck with that, now he's grown.
Hour and half though? Blimey!
Ratcatcher
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024 The UK is a totally different market for poultry. People there pay a good price for quality and good breeding, here people will only pay a little more. Admittedly she was a beauty, probably the best I have bred, but I was getting 50+ for anything that was up to breed standards. The downside was you needed to spend that sort of money to get good breeding stock.
The best thing with relative humidity is ignore it! The background humidity is so high in Ireland that you don't need to add any water untill day 18 when you stop turning then keep the incubator closed until you're ready to remove the chicks. Most people fail because they keep the humidity too high. The eggs don't loose enough water during incubation so the air sac is too small, so the fully developed chicks can't breathe and fail to hatch. They then think they didn't hatch because the humidity was too low and they couldn't get out the shells, so they add more water next time and things only get worse.
I have only dry hatched for over 20yrs and expect 90% hatches.
Most of what is written about incubation, including the incubator manuals, assumes you live in mainland America or Europe where it is far drier.
Glyn
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024 " The background humidity is so high in Ireland. "
Tell me about it! :D Here's the Craziest bit though? Delivery driver pulls up, at my gate. He gets out. We make small talk. Out of the blue, he glances up, to his left. Down to his right. Says; " It must be Fierce humid, here? " :O
And, he meant Here. Not Ireland. Not Leitrim. Here. Right Here. This spot. And, I think he's right. What topographical data he gleaned, from simply glancing at the ground around him? God only knows. But, this desk currently sits in 62F, unheated, at 78%RH.
Anyway, yeah. RH. Choose a 'bator. Collect the meg eggs. Then, get that post card: 'We're Cutting The Power, Next Week'? Russian Roulette. I've never been a gambler. I want a fall back position.
Then, I have the winter, and Cerberus. Popping him in his poly box is no longer an option.
It's so hard, to get grass roots, 'What I've found', even manufacturers, information on the nitty gritty. " Ideal for camping ... fridge, charge stuff ..."
Fridge?! Those things suck like trains! How long ye meant to keep That going, filling it up, every hour and half? Maybe I need a Camping Forum? Remember those days, Glyn? Forum for what ever took ye mind :(
Funny; In the films, it's always a big, hand cranked lump. And, it lives in a rough little low shed. Well away from the house. And the mad axeman's in there.
Now, it's Sine Waves.
Ratcatcher
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024
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Generators?
Small ones. Anyone any experience, please? Asking around sort of left me thinking a 2Kw one would do. Now, I've just read these things may run for a couple of hours, on a fill? Not a lot then?
Leitrim has quite enough, announced, four hour cuts. I'd like to run an incubator :|
Monday, September 30th, 2024
The thing to watch is that you get an inverter generator that produces a true sine wave. The cheaper generators produces a square wave that can muck up the control circuits of most modern incubators. If you can find a analog incubator like a hovabator it will be less susceptible.
There are 12v incubators that you can run off a car battery but I have no direct experience of them or you could run a 240v incubator using an inverter off a car battery.
Personaly I go low tech. We have several 8 hour cuts each summer (4 last year). I built a polystyerene box large enough to hold the incubator plus several bottles of blood heat water. This keeps the incubator at an acceptable level and I still get good hatch rates.
Eggs aren't as vulnerable as most people assume to temperature drops, especially during the first and last weeks of incubation, so if you get sufficient warning try to time your incubation to avoid that middle week.
I once hatched an Indian runner egg that had been cold for 2 days when an incubator broke down, the duck sold for £145 at auction.
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024
Eggs will last a day or more no problem as long as its not the last few days of hatching dont open the incubator keep what heat is in it.
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024
Thanks, guys! :)
Glyn; Sine Waves! Yeah! (What witchcraft is This?!) Came across all that. Haven't a Clue. But, I Did pick up that I need the True stuff / one.
Yeah. I'd like the chance to do a bit more than just run the inc', in the dark. While machines do seem to step up by 50watts a time, I'm told a 2000 is where to look. And 'Inverter' too. Yep.
£3 - 500 mark? Doesn't bother me. I'll breed Indian Runners! LMAO! (How did it do That, Glyn?! What do they usually go for? Surely that's Insane money?)
My complete downfall though came when I found we're meant to expect, like, hour and half(?!) off a full tank! *What?!* :o
I think That's the thing I'm really trying to get a lead on here. Real life ~ horror? ~ stories. Maybe of why we don't hear the buzz of gennies, when the lights go out.
Paddy; Ye mention of eggs lasting was a timely reminder that I Must check out the RH requirements of eggs, while they wait to go In the incu'.
I came across all that, earlier this year. Somehow went into a tailspin as I couldn't think how to effect RH, at that point. But, I did realise the dozen MEG Bantam eggs I had were now Dog food. As were countless of their eggs. Not Next year, if I can help it!
Used a poly box, for my frog, Cerberus, before. Good luck with that, now he's grown.
Hour and half though? Blimey!
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024
The UK is a totally different market for poultry. People there pay a good price for quality and good breeding, here people will only pay a little more. Admittedly she was a beauty, probably the best I have bred, but I was getting 50+ for anything that was up to breed standards. The downside was you needed to spend that sort of money to get good breeding stock.
The best thing with relative humidity is ignore it! The background humidity is so high in Ireland that you don't need to add any water untill day 18 when you stop turning then keep the incubator closed until you're ready to remove the chicks. Most people fail because they keep the humidity too high. The eggs don't loose enough water during incubation so the air sac is too small, so the fully developed chicks can't breathe and fail to hatch. They then think they didn't hatch because the humidity was too low and they couldn't get out the shells, so they add more water next time and things only get worse.
I have only dry hatched for over 20yrs and expect 90% hatches.
Most of what is written about incubation, including the incubator manuals, assumes you live in mainland America or Europe where it is far drier.
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024
" The background humidity is so high in Ireland. "
Tell me about it! :D Here's the Craziest bit though? Delivery driver pulls up, at my gate. He gets out. We make small talk. Out of the blue, he glances up, to his left. Down to his right. Says; " It must be Fierce humid, here? " :O
And, he meant Here. Not Ireland. Not Leitrim. Here. Right Here. This spot. And, I think he's right. What topographical data he gleaned, from simply glancing at the ground around him? God only knows. But, this desk currently sits in 62F, unheated, at 78%RH.
Anyway, yeah. RH. Choose a 'bator. Collect the meg eggs. Then, get that post card: 'We're Cutting The Power, Next Week'? Russian Roulette. I've never been a gambler. I want a fall back position.
Then, I have the winter, and Cerberus. Popping him in his poly box is no longer an option.
It's so hard, to get grass roots, 'What I've found', even manufacturers, information on the nitty gritty. " Ideal for camping ... fridge, charge stuff ..."
Fridge?! Those things suck like trains! How long ye meant to keep That going, filling it up, every hour and half? Maybe I need a Camping Forum? Remember those days, Glyn? Forum for what ever took ye mind :(
Funny; In the films, it's always a big, hand cranked lump. And, it lives in a rough little low shed. Well away from the house. And the mad axeman's in there.
Now, it's Sine Waves.
Tuesday, October 1st, 2024