VENTILATION AND MOISTURE IN INCUBATORS 



THE GREATEST PROBLEM IN SUCCESSFUL ARTIFICIAL INCUBATION IS IN VENTILATION AND 

 MOISTURE— THE EGG CONTAINS A PROPER PROPORTION OF ELEMENTS TO BUILD UP THE 

 EMBRYONIC STRUCTURE— DEATH OF THE EMBRYO FOLLOWS ABUSE OF NATURE'S LAWS 



H. E. MOSS 



ONE of the anomalies in the incubator business of to- 

 day is the diversity of treatment to which eggs are 

 required to be subjected under the instructions of 

 the makers of the various machines now on the market and 

 their ability to furnish pages of testimonials in support of 

 their claims of the merits of their particular machine. There 

 can be but one correct process or method of incubation, and' 

 that is nature's method. If we would duplicate nature we 

 must conform to her method. I have be- 

 fore me thirty catalogues from as many 

 different incubator manufacturers. I have 

 • been examining these books and compar- 

 ing the claims and theories of the different 

 makers so far as they pertain to the essen- 

 tial requirements of a successful hatcher. 

 There is but one point upon which they 

 all agree, and that is the proper incubat- 

 ing temperature. The ease with which 

 this fact can be determined accounts for 

 this, but there are other conditions besides 

 temperature upon which successful hatch- 

 ing depends, and in these they not only 

 advance contrary theories', but in'some 

 instances proclaim them as"j^self-evident , 

 truths. Turning and cooling the eggs are 

 provided for in various ways, some even 

 going so far as to furnish a cooling schedule 

 for each day of the hatch, each one differ- 

 ing from the other. It is not with this 

 question, however, that I propose .to deal 

 at this time, but the one embraced in 

 ventilation and moisture. 



We are told very emphatically by 

 some that at the end of a certain day the 

 egg must show an air space to correspond 

 with a given diagram, and at the end of 

 certain other days it must show certain 

 other fixed lines of air space, and that if 

 the eggs are placed in warm water on a 

 certain day and they float with an exposed 

 surface equal to a silver quarter in size, 

 the evaporation is right. Now this may 

 all be approximately correct and agree 

 with normal conditions, but they go 

 further and say that if they are found de- 

 ficient the ventilation must be increased 

 and if excessive it must be diminished and 

 moisture introduced. 



This sounds very plausible to the un- 

 thinking or those who jump at conclusions. 

 That all eggs lose a certain amount of 

 moisture during incubation is very appar- 

 ent, but the question is how do they lose 

 it? From the rules they lay down for the purpose of increas- 

 ing or diminishing the air space, we must assume their hypo- 

 thesis to be that there is a certain amount of water created 

 in the egg that does not belong there and that, the Creator 

 made the incubating body a party to the reproductive pro- 

 cess, and did not create a perfect egg in a perfect condition 



to reproduce the species without the intervention of this 

 outside agency to rearrange, as it were, its contents. 

 The absurdity of such a hypothesis is apparent. 

 Can we imagine for one moment that in His infinite 

 wisdom He would establish any incomplete- or imperfect 

 thing, or law, as must be inferred in this case, whereby 

 some species are taught to deposit their eggs in suitable 

 locations and never see them atterward, and that such eggs 

 should not contain the proper proportions 

 of all the elements necessary to build up 

 the embryonic structure? No, we cannot 

 conceive of any such condition. We must 

 assume that whatever is placed within the 

 egg is necessary to the perfect develop- 

 ment of its germ, and that if we wish to 

 incubate it successfully we must not rob 

 it of any one element or any part of one, 

 and that if we do it suffers in consequence 

 and in proportion to the degree of abuse 

 to which we Subject it. 



It has taken a number of years for 

 incubator makers and operators to correct 

 their ventilation. Carbon dioxide has 

 been a bugbear. They find they need no 

 longer fear this. They now unintention- 

 ally cease robbing the egg of its moisture 

 and realize the fact that under the new 

 conditions the hatches approxirhate nat- 

 ural methods. The moisture pan is now 

 a back number. The only benefit it ever 

 worked was to partially equalize the 

 aqueous tension between the inner and 

 outer air, a condition which need not exist 

 in a modern incubator. A current of cold 

 air drawn in through the ventilating flues 

 increases its capacity for moisture in pro- 

 portion to the increase in its temperature. 

 Its relative humidity being lower than the 

 outer air, it gathers moisture from the 

 eggs in sufficient quantity to restore the 

 equilibrium. The allantois is robbed of 

 its fluid and the membrane becomes dry, 

 destroying its function as a respiratory 

 organ, and death of the embryo follows. 

 The greatest mortality from this cause 

 occurs during the third week. 



The ventilating flues and forced drafts 

 with which many machines of to-day are 

 equipped are wrong in principle, although 

 it is possible to operate fairly well with 

 . them, provided the apertures are reduced 

 to the minimum and employed solely for 

 the purpose of maintaining the air pure 

 in the egg chamber. Natural variations in the atmospheric 

 humidity exert no influence, provided the aqueous tension 

 is held the same within the egg chamber as without, and 

 this is attainable in very few machines. 



From the hour the egg reaches the incubating tempera- 

 ture there is a condition present within it which I have 



