Differentiated incubation of chicken eggs

Vladimir N. Domatskiy

Abstract: This article compares two modes for incubating eggs from Radonezh crossbred chickens: (1) in a stable incubation environment at 37.6°C in a setter and at 37.2°C in a hatcher (relative humidity 52% and 53%, respectively); (2) differentiated, with a sharp temperature increase (by almost 1°C) from the end of the second day to day four. In both cases, specific indicators were determined, such as water loss, embryo mass trajectories, healthy hatches, hatchability, the number of eggs failed to hatch, and the duration of embryogenesis. The research was performed on the Borovskaya Poultry Farm (Borovsky, Tyumen Region, Russian Federation), specialized in egg production, in 2016 /2018. The research shows that differentiated incubation, unlike the incubation in a stable environment, improves hatch rates (by 4.6 to 5.0% on average) and hatchability (by 4.1 to 4.4%) through the reduced percentage of dead-in-shell embryos and blood rings. This incubation mode synchronizes the hatching by 23.7% and reduces the period of embryonic development by 6-8 hours. It was revealed that during incubation, experimental and control embryos had their heart rates decreasing with time. When this happens, experimental embryos demonstrate a heart rate 5-6 beats per minute higher compared to control ones incubated in a stable environment. At high temperatures, differentiated incubation entails increased water evaporation, followed by shifts in energy metabolism towards a more intensive use of lipids for the production of metabolic water and glucose synthesis.

Keywords: chicken egg; crossbreeding; differentiated incubation; incubation

Date published: 2019-12-10