I will be receiving two emu eggs this week. I am so worried about trying to hatch them. Is there anyone who can give me some advise on this. Tempature, humidity, rotating and so on. Also, do chicken eggs have to be at an angle when they are in the incubator?
I've never hatched an emu egg, but the other geneticist in our department has. The important thing is humidity and the humidity should be much lower than you have it set for chicken eggs. A wetbulb temperature of 70-75 degrees F (24-35% relative humidity) is needed to get the required weight loss in the eggs. There doesn't seem to be a need to increase the humidity during the hatch. The optimum temperature is between 96.5 and 97.5 degrees F for the set and it takes from 49-54 days for the eggs to hatch. *** 97 degrees is for a forced air incubator I don't know what the temp should be for a still air incubator.
Please HELP
By Rokimoto on Wednesday, March 13, 2002 - 06:19 pm:
There is a recommendation that you weigh the eggs on a fine scale so that you can monitor weight loss and increase or decrease the humidity as needed. Eggs should lose between 13% and 17% of their orignial weight during incubation. For a 600 gram egg the weight has to decrease to a final weight of between 498 to 522 grams. This is less than 2 grams a day for the set. If your eggs are loosing too much weight each day you have to increase the humidity in your incubator. If you don't have a fine scale you will just have to take your chances with the recommendations.
The temperature can be set one degree lower for the hatch, or you can leave it the same.
They recommend turning the eggs by rolling them back and forth 3 times a day. If you have a tilting tray autoturner you probably have to secure the eggs and keep them from rolling. The eggs are usually set on their sides.
You need good airflow in your incubator and hatcher.
It sounds like a lot can go wrong in 50 days, good luck.