Now that you've got your incubator built, let's hatch some quail!
Let's do a little calibration on that incubator you just built. The probe should dangle inside the incubator just high enough it doesn't touch the eggs. You want the eggs to be 100F. But Ruck, I read online that you need bla bla bla, 100F! Go ahead and set your W1209 for 100F (mine is in celcius, so make sure you don't boil them at 100C). Grab a little thermometer or one of those radar-looking thermometer guns or your dad's thermocouple or whatever. Put some golf balls or whatever you've got in the incubator and turn it on for a day or so. Test the inside temperature. Bump your module up or down so the stuff inside is ~100F. The eggs around the edges might only be 99F and the eggs in the middle might be 101F, no big deal just do your best.
Now you're going to need some eggs. Order them or ask a friend or collect your own from existing hens. If you're collecting your own eggs, you can collect them for up to a week before placing the entire batch into the incubator. I usually collect for no more than 5 days. While you're storing the eggs, put them point down. This is moderately important, store them point down. There's an air bubble inside and the physics of the egg bla bla bla, just do what I said. If you're unsure whether they're fertilized or not, crack open a couple. If you look real good at the yolks, you'll see a tiny white cheerio on there. Tiny, but visible to the naked eye. You see it? That means it's fertilized!
I like to use sand to hold my eggs. Remember how I said in my last post we're using a trash bag as a liner? It's slippery on their little feet, so I hatch on sand. You can put a little tupperwear full of it in there or fill up the whole bottom with 1/2" of sand, doesn't matter. Stick your eggs down in the sand with the pointy end down (remember?). Turn on your incubator so the sand can warm up before you put in the eggs.
The sand is optional, but I like my birds to have the best chance of survival. This was my first build, no sand: https://files.catbox.moe/wwq4at.jpg
Here's what my schedule is like. On saturday night or sunday morning, I fill my incubator with eggs. I know that 2 sundays from then (14 days) eggs will start popping. Put your ear to the incubator, hear that little army stirring inside those eggs? Let them hatch for a couple days. They don't need food or water or anything at this point. So, if they started hatching on sunday, by tuesday they'll be done. If they don't start popping until monday or tuesday, just give them the full 2 days to finish (your temps might have been a hair low).
You'll have some that didn't hatch, toss them out. You'll have some that maybe died half out of the shell, toss them too. You might even have a sickly one that made it out but died, same thing. There's no sense in nursing one that can't walk right or can't hold its head up right. I'll explain in a later post how to run a proper breeding program to minimize losses.
As long as they are dry, take them out of the incubator and into the brooder. You'll notice a lot of dust in your incubator. Their fuzzy little feathers are finer than frog hair, and the fan will blow them around a bit. This will collect on your bulbs and fan, so wipe them down between batches.
If you ordered eggs, plan on half of them hatching. If you bought eggs from some weirdo you found on craigslist, expect 50% - 70% hatching. Once you've got your breeding program running strong, expect +80% to hatch. As long as you end up with a single male and a female, you can breed hundreds over the course of a year.
Hopefully you ended up with this and not alligators or something: https://files.catbox.moe/wdq7uh.jpg
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