Incubation Methods for Nightly Temperature Drops

2turtletom

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Joined
Mar 17, 2018
Messages
324
Location (City and/or State)
Akron, Ohio
Hello! I’m about to embark on my second cycle of trying to hatch Kinixys Homeana eggs. Craig Smalley has had success using nightly temperature drops. I’m trying to create a setup that would incubate the eggs at 80-82 degrees or so during the day and then drop to about 75 at night.

I’d love to hear your ideas for possibly doing this. What equipment would you use? Is there any incubator on the market that can be programmed to do this automatically?

I’ve kept Kinixys for 25 years but have only within he last year tried to actively breed them and incubate eggs. The first 9 failed to develop, now I have five more.

Thanks for your help and thoughts!

Tom, Worthington, Ohio, USA
 

Kapidolo Farms

Well-Known Member
10 Year Member!
Tortoise Club
Platinum Tortoise Club
Joined
Nov 7, 2012
Messages
5,173
Location (City and/or State)
South of Southern California, but not Mexico
There are thermostats that you can program for a drop, but them you'd need a chill unit. Many folks keep the incubator a temp controlled room at the low temp and put a time on the incubator for the high temp.

There is another set up/system using an aquarium chiller to cool the incubation down. That would be much more complicated to establish.
 

mark1

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Joined
Dec 31, 2015
Messages
1,932
Location (City and/or State)
ohio
if you use water as a the heat source , the type incubator that utilizes a container within a container of heated water , you can use 2 aquarium heaters , the warmer one on a timer …………
 

2turtletom

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Joined
Mar 17, 2018
Messages
324
Location (City and/or State)
Akron, Ohio
There are thermostats that you can program for a drop, but them you'd need a chill unit. Many folks keep the incubator a temp controlled room at the low temp and put a time on the incubator for the high temp.

There is another set up/system using an aquarium chiller to cool the incubation down. That would be much more complicated to establish.

Thanks Will- I have sensor push operating now to determine just how cool some of my reptile rooms get at night. Probably the way I'll go is to try to drop increase the room's temperature during the day, turn off any heat at night. Now I just need to find either an incubator that can do that, or a thermostat that is attached to some type of heating element (heat tape?- I've never used it...What about a Radiant Heat Panel) that i use in some type of enclosed chamber. I'm also thinking about just using the old aquarium heater in water method in a styrofoam cooler. Choices, choices. Thanks Will!
 

2turtletom

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Joined
Mar 17, 2018
Messages
324
Location (City and/or State)
Akron, Ohio
if you use water as a the heat source , the type incubator that utilizes a container within a container of heated water , you can use 2 aquarium heaters , the warmer one on a timer …………

Awesome, that's a great idea, this is exactly the type of ideas I'm looking for. Thanks Mark!
 

New Posts

Top