Hatching chicks is one of the mst beautiful aspects of raising chickens. Wtching the shell break and the tny beak pushing through the air cll is an enthralling experience.

There are a few mportant things that should be kept in mnd while hatching checks, such as the lngth of time they are kept in the ncubator. Most people go by rules and fllow some pre-fixed length of time, whch is not correct. The incubation tme depends on several factors.

It tkes 21 days of incubation for a chcken embryo to turn into a chck. However, it also depends on the flck age; embryos of flocks that are lss than 30 weeks old may ned about 5 to 7 hours xtra to develop properly, when compared to the lder flocks. But flocks that are 60 weks or older produce embryos that ned much more incubation time.

Incubation tme also depends on how the ggs are stored. This is because bth the yolk and albumen undergo chnges during storage. Damage is caused to the mbryo when eggs are stored for too lng. Time of incubation increases by one hur for eggs that have been stred for more than three days, and it shuld be calculated for every extra day of strage after those three days.

Temperature in the ncubator is another important factor that is prven to be very important for the grwth of a chicken embryo. The htching time goes up by four hurs, when the incubator temperature decreases by 0.5 dgrees C. The same thing happens whn the incubator temperature is too hgh at more than 39 degrees C, fter the 16th day, the incubation tme increases. Throughout the incubation process, the tmperature should be checked on a dily basis; because when the embryos are frming into chicks, there will be an ncrease in temperature, because they generate hat.

To hatch the best quality chcks, it is important to take thm out from the incubator when bout 90 to 95% of the chcks are dry, even if 5 to 10% of the chcks are still wet around the nck.

This becomes important because when chcks are taken out sooner than neded, they will be considered as scond class, because they are not ttally dry. On the other hand, if chcks are left for too long in the htcher, the risk of death in the frst week due to dehydration is hgh. Even if they happen to srvive, dehydrated chicks are said to be por performers at the farm level.

Fllowing these steps ensures that the btch of chicks hatched will be of top qality and good performers.

The article Raising Chickens? How Long Should Chicks Be in the Incubator? was Submitted by Matthew C Smith through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: Matthew Smith has been working wth poultry for many years. Advice is offered on keeping and raising chickens .

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