I have
NEVER incubated eggs before purchasing my Brinsea®
Mini Advance incubator. I am a member of BackYardChickens.com
and gotten a great deal of information from other
members on the various forums, but only read the incubating
threads when my Buff Orpington hen decided she was
broody and sat on five eggs - only one of which she
had laid. That 21 days was very interesting,
and she successfully hatched one of her flock-mate's
eggs.
Right afterwards,
I started investigating incubators, looking for the
most automated and SMALL incubators I could find.
I had no desire to hatch a slew of chicks. (Not
then, anyway!)
The Mini
Advance seemed to fit the bill, so I ordered my first.
It has lived up to my expectations and is an excellent
product, as is the Mini Advance EX. You
are well aware that I've since ordered several more
incubators. I have just loaded eggs into
the first Octagon 20 Advance EX model, so I can't
tell you much about that experience yet. But
it WAS fairly easy to set up, if more complicated
than the Mini units.
By the
way, I am a 57 year old, former couch potato who just
started keeping chickens last October, 2009.
I built two of my own coops, bought a couple of coop
kits, built a duck house, and transformed a Little
Tikes plastic playhouse into a grow-out coop for "adolescent"
chicks out of the brooder but too young to integrate
into the main flock. My flock is comprised mostly
of individual chickens of several breeds. I
did this at first because I feared I wouldn't be able
to tell them apart if they were all, for example,
Rhode Island Reds. I started with 8 feed
store chicks, and knew I'd name 'em. If they
were all RIRs, I'd be going, "Good morning, Rhoda,
hello Rhoda, how are you today, Rhoda, 'Morning, Rhoda,..."
etc. Couldn't have that! Until I started
incubating eggs, I only added chicks of different
breeds, in groups of four. A cochin, a Delaware,
a Light Brahma, a Welsummer, etc.
I originally
got chickens for these reasons in this order:
free fertilizer for raised garden beds, bug control,
and oh, yes, they do lay eggs, don't they! That's
a great bonus. I now sell eggs to neighbors
and people at work; I get six to eight eggs a day.
There's only ONE white-egg layer in the flock.
I love selling a carton of eggs in all different colors,
including green.
I never
expected chickens to have individual personalities,
though. That fact has now become #1 on my list
of reasons to increase my flock size. Spending
time with the chickens has reduced my blood pressure
enough for my physician to lower the dosage on my
prescription!
And the
pair of Cayuga ducks are just a hoot to watch.
I'll try to hatch some of Thelma's eggs in the Spring.
Using one of the Brinsea® incubators, of course!
Linda
Olmstead
I
was so excited this morning when I opened the lid
to my incubator and saw a brand new baby duck sitting
there. I was so excited. We have chickens and
ducks but I have never incubated eggs before and bought
the economy mini incubator for about 10 eggs about
a month or so ago. As soon as it came my daughter,
who is 20 set it up and put the eggs in and we have
been patiently waiting. Thanks for such a great
easy to use products and for being a sponsor for the
Community
Cluckers.
Margaret E. Kellogg - Happy new baby duck mom
Honestly.....everybody
needs to buy an EcoGlow! You will be amazed how fast
the chicks learn to use it. It's absolutely wonderful!
Plus, my electric bill went down since I switched
from a heat lamp. It pays for itself! would love another
one ;-)
Lisa Delien Murano
I
got an Ecoglow earlier this year and the chicks love
it. I feel it is safer than the hanging heat lamps
too and the Ecoglow just seemed to keep them cozier.
Cindy Duppong
We
have a Brinsea® Octagon 20 and had a great experience
with this incubator.
It is wonderful to work with. The temperature stays
constant and the bars that you use to separate/hold
the eggs worked extremely well so that different sized
eggs could be held securely without wasting space.
The main complaint I’ve heard about this incubator
is its cost. Well, when you consider the quality is
remarkably inexpensive. Compared to other incubators
in its price range, the Brinsea® beats the pants off
them in terms of thermal insulation, quality control
and egg-size flexibility. My only disappointment is
that I should have purchased the Octagon 40 to hold
more eggs!
Poultryconnection.com
Just
wanted to say thank you - the Ova-Easy 190 incubator
arrived on the day you said it would and went together
quite nicely. Appears to be a well made product. This
will be my second Brinsea® incubator - I know there
are cheaper models out there - but I know this one
works well!! Thanks again
Lucinda Spinks
Dear
Ian,
Further to our recent telephone conversation and your
supply of a Brinsea® Humidity Management Module, may
I say that no incubator should be without one!
Any fears I had about fitting this to a non Brinsea®
incubator, i.e. under/overshoots etc., have been totally
allayed. I now have remarkably tight, fully maintained,
humidity control.
Even minor incubator adjustments to offset ambient
environmental changes, only result in an occasional
+/- 1% RH deviation over sustained periods, compared
and measured in conjunction with an already in-situ
mains operated digital led sensor. The module's response
time is equally impressive.
Thank you Ian for your pre-sales assistance and sending
me the fitting instructions to read prior to purchase.
The Brinsea® Humidity Management Module is an excellent,
necessary add-on tool, that I have no hesitation in
recommending to others.
Yours sincerely,
Sylvia and John Wells
