Warm Water Trick for Hatching Eggs – How Does This Work?
If you raise any bird, you expect these birds to hatch their eggs between 18 and 21 days. That means there could be a problem with the eggs if your bird doesn’t hatch within this duration.
An incubator can help you hatch your eggs, but you might not have access to an incubator. Thankfully, you can use the warm water trick to hatch chicks if you don’t have an incubator at your disposal.
What is the Warm Water Trick for Hatching Eggs?
The warm trick hatching method is a simple trick you can use to check if eggs are ready to hatch and also help you hatch eggs. It’s particularly helpful for people who don’t have incubators or broody hens.
How to Hatch Eggs with Warm Water?
Hatching your chicks is quite easy, even if you don’t have an incubator, thanks to the warm water trick for hatching eggs. After all, it’s only half the eggs you put in an incubator that will hatch. If you’re thinking about hatching eggs yet don’t have an incubator at your disposal, you can try these steps below to carry out the warm water trick for hatching eggs.
- Put some water in a ceramic bowl.
- Put the bowl into the microwave for a couple of minutes on medium heat
- Dampen soft clothing in the warm water
- Wrap the egg in the soft clothing
- Place the wrapped egg in the clothing in a bowl
- Place a heat source over the bowl, preferably a heat lamp
Caution!
While carrying out the warm water trick for hatching eggs, you must maintain the warming temperature between 37.2 Celsius and 37.5 Celsius to ensure the successful hatching of the eggs you want to hatch.
Furthermore, you should rotate the soft clothing after six to eight hours to ensure the heat on the clothing reaches each egg you want to hatch. Keep moistening the towel each time you turn the egg up, to ensure a baby chick hatches between one or two days.
Risks of Hatching Eggs in Warm Water
While the warm water trick for hatching eggs is an effective way to hatch eggs, this method isn’t always effective. It has its risks like other methods for hatching eggs. For instance, using too much hot water while carrying out this method can make the eggs fail to hatch. Placing the eggs wrongly can also work against the success of this trick.
Moreover, this trick for hatching your eggs can expose the eggs to the risk of bacterial growth. The success of this egg-hatching method depends entirely on individual work. You can minimize the risk of this trick by ensuring you observe the right hatching temperatures, which is 100.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
You should also position the eggs properly to ensure this method doesn’t backfire on your egg-hatching efforts.
How Long Does it Take for an Egg to Hatch?
The hatching period for most birds is between 18 and 21 days. It can, however, go beyond 30 days. Some broody hens, for instance, leave their hatching nests each time, thus prolonging their hatching period.
Furthermore, it depends on the number of eggs a hen sits on. The more the number of eggs your broody hen is sitting on, the longer it will take to hatch eggs.
Why Didn’t the Egg Hatch?
We all expect eggs to hatch within the expected time. However, our birds may disappoint us in hatching because they might not hatch the eggs they have been sitting on for days for many reasons. These are some reasons why your eggs didn’t hatch as you expected.
- Infertile eggs– Infertile eggs don’t hatch. In most instances, infertile eggs have no embryos inside them. Maybe your hen didn’t mate with a cockerel, explaining why it didn’t lay fertile eggs. Or, the eggs could be too old, making them infertile to hatch. Alternatively, the eggs didn’t develop during the laying process and were infertile.
- Temperature changes- Temperatures have a role to play in the hatching of an egg. The Wrong hatching temperatures can make eggs cease developing, making them unable to hatch. Even if you were to hatch your eggs in an incubator, they wouldn’t hatch into chicks if you didn’t hatch them at the appropriate temperatures.
- Chicks’ death– At times, eggs can be quite fertile, and the chicks could be ready to hatch when it gets to the hatching time. Sometimes the chick can refuse to get from the egg because it’s dead. High humidity levels can kill the chicks in the eggs before they hatch.
- Rotten eggs-leaving the eggs on your counter for too long can make them rot. Eggs rot for different reasons, such as improper temperature storage or perhaps your hen left its eggs somewhere for too long. Rotten eggs don’t hatch into chicks, no matter the effort you make to make the rotten eggs hatch.
- Eggs are hatching too early– The other possible reason your hen didn’t hatch her eggs is that she might probably have hatched the eggs too early. Extremely high temperatures can make your hen hatch her eggs too early. At that point, the embryos in the eggs won’t be ready to hatch, and you can’t expect the eggs to hatch.
- Malformed baby chicks-eggs with malformed embryos can’t hatch into live baby chicks. Malformation in chicks before they hatch can be due to improper parental nutrition or incorrect setting of eggs.
Does This Method Work with Chickens?
Yes, it does. The warm water hatching trick for eggs can work for all birds, including chickens. Using this method, you can hatch your baby chicks if you carry out the trick properly.
This hatching method is more successful for people trying to hatch their quails’ or pigeons’ eggs. Nonetheless, if you do it appropriately, this method will help you hatch any bird’s eggs, including ducks‘ and turkeys’ eggs.
Conclusion
The warm water trick for hatching eggs is an excellent way for people without an incubator or broody hens to hatch their eggs. However, the success of this trick will work well for those who can implement it and avoid its risks.
