incubator
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incubator
Bibliography
See R. E. Austic and M. C. Nesheim, Poultry Production (13th ed. 1990); M. North, Commercial Chicken Production (1990).
Incubator
apparatus for artificially hatching the young of poultry from eggs.
The simplest incubators—special rooms, heated barrels, and stoves—were known in tropical countries thousands of years ago. In Europe and the USA, various types of incubators appeared in the 19th century. Before the October Revolution in Russia, only individual amateur poultry farmers had incubators; they were first manufactured commercially in the USSR in 1928. Until 1941, poultry farms used incubators with such brand names as Ukrainskii Gigant, Kommunar, and Spartak, with a capacity of 16,000 to 24,000 eggs. Modern incubators in the USSR—cabinet and closet types (the most widely used)—are complex apparatus in which maintenance of the necessary temperature and humidity, ventilation, and turning of the eggs, that is, the entire incubation process, are taken care of automatically. Stable conditions of incubation make it possible to have 95 percent success in hatching the young in incubators. Incubators can operate at any time of the year, and the quality of the young birds is no different from the quality of those hatched under a brood hen; labor is decreased by a factor of 25. In 1971 the total capacity of the operating incubators in the USSR was more than 1.7 billion eggs.
Table 1. Characteristics of incubators used in the USSR | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Rekord-39 | Universal-45 | Universal-50 | |||
Incubating closet | Hatching closet | Incubating closet | Hatching closet | ||
Capacity (number of eggs) | 39,312 | 37,440 | 6,240 | 44,304 | 6,480 |
Dimensions (m) | |||||
Height . . . . . . . . . . . | 2.8 | 2.55 | 2.55 | 2.44 | 2.44 |
Width . . . . . . . . . . . . | 3.1 | 2.35 | 2.24 | 2.2 | 2.2 |
Length . . . . . . . . . . . | 4.1 | 5.22 | 1.83 | 5.34 | 2.13 |
Number of trays | |||||
Incubating trays . . . . . . | 216 | 312 | — | 312 | — |
Hatching trays . . . . . . | 40 | — | 52 | — | 52 |
Temperature range (°C) | |||||
maintained with accuracy | |||||
±0.2°C . . . . . . . . . . . . | 36–38 | 36–38 | 36–37 | 36–38 | 36–38 |
Range of relative humidity of air (%) maintained with accuracy to ± 3 % . . . . | 40–80 | 40–80 | 40–80 | 40–80 | 40–80 |
The cabinet incubator (Rekord-39, Rekord-42) is a thermostatic box, along two sides of which there are columns with trays for the eggs. It is intended primarily for the incubation of chicken, turkey, and guinea-fowl eggs. The closet incubator (Universal-45, Universal-50, Universal-50 M) consists of two independent apparatus—an incubating apparatus with three closets in one frame and a hatching apparatus in a separate frame. In the incubating closets the trays with the eggs are arranged in rotating drums mounted on a shaft; in the hatching closet, they are placed on a 12-tiered shelf. Closet incubators can also be used to incubate the eggs of water fowl (geese and ducks). (See Table 1 for a description of incubators used in the USSR.) Outside the USSR (in the USA, Canada, Great Britain, Italy) continuous sectional incubators are used, in each section of which the incubating and hatching processes are combined. A similar type of incubator is being adapted by industry in the USSR.
Incubators are kept in incubator houses, which are part of poultry hatcheries.
REFERENCES
Tret’iakov, N. P. Inkubalsiia, 3rd ed. Moscow, 1957.Orlov, M. V. Biologicheskii kontrol’ v inkubatsii. Moscow, 1963.
A. A. SHTALTOVYI
Incubator
for infants, an apparatus with an artificial micro-climate to house premature babies so that they remain warm and retain their body heat. Optimum temperature (33°-38°C), humidity (85-100 percent), and oxygen content (33-60 percent) are automatically maintained, and there is a constant oxygen supply. The premature infant is placed in the closed incubator naked on a sponge mattress. It is cared for through a special opening (or sleeve) and observed through the incubator’s transparent walls.