21 Days and 7 hours -- only 3 birds hatched -- should I be worried?

[Guest]

Another trick to try when opening the doors on a Sportsman is, rather than pouring water on the floor (!), use a spray mister bottle filled with hot water, and mist the humidity pads and around any unhatched eggs quickly.

I do that and it helps keep the temps and humidity good after I pull out chicks that are ready to go out but still have eggs that haven\'t hatched.

[Blue Egg Acres]

use a spray mister bottle filled with hot water, and mist the humidity pads and around any unhatched eggs quickly.

This is what I usually do, but it seems once I open the door I can never regain the humidity back to what it was. I\'m going to try Chris\'s suggestion and turn the water pan sideways. Also going to try putting a spare water pan with hot water in it in the bottom of the hatcher.

Chris, where did you get the magnetic thermometer?

[Guest]

Barb got it at Wal-mart.
Looks like they pretty much finished hatching by this morning opened the door at noon. there were 23 live chicks 3 pipped and died  out of 31 eggs. Most were hatched in 21 days and 4 hours

[John]

the top center vent is open 1/2 way bottom center vent is barley cracked open. the rest are closed

The newer GQF 1502\'s have smaller center vent holes in the back and they don\'t have the little metal doors so you can\'t adjust them.  I keep the other vents closed and they work very well.  You wouldn\'t notice them all at a glance, but there are many little improvements that have been made to the Sportsman over the past 20 years.