Diary of Poultry Farmer: My painful struggle with incubator

A farmer in Nyeri, displays the eggs in one of his incubators. Some farmers say incubators imported from Europe are more expensive but reliable. PHOTO | BONIFACE MWANGI | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • After assessing, the only problem he found was a cardboard placed on the window to prevent rain from getting into the veranda which had blocked the opening that allows the fan to let hot air out.
  • He also recommended that I sterilise the incubator which I did using surgical spirit.
  • At this juncture, you probably expect me to proffer solutions to all the incubator challenges I have recounted. I will disappoint you.
  • Another farmer told me in confidence that incubators imported from Europe are more expensive but reliable.

You probably recall that sometime in December last year, I started having problems with my 500 egg capacity made-in-China incubator, which I bought at Sh64,000 from a supplier in Nairobi.

Then, I had incubated 180 eggs but instead of hatching the 160 chicks as expected (I had been getting 80 per cent hatch rate for five months consecutively), all the eggs were ‘cooked’.

That time, I had an order to deliver 150 day-old chicks just before Christmas to Stanley and Lucy from Utawala in Nairobi, but I could not honour my promise.

I called the supplier who sent his technician. After assessing, the only problem he found was a cardboard placed on the window to prevent rain from getting into the veranda.

The board had blocked the opening that allows the fan to let hot air out. After checking the fan, element and motor, he assured me they were all working.

I then incubated 180 eggs but barely got 50 chicks, same as before the repairs. For the second batch, I got 30 chicks out of 180 eggs I had incubated.

I thought I was the only farmer having problems with incubators but when I spoke to Angela Kariuki Kiove, a poultry farmer from Athi River, I learnt that the grass is not greener across the fence.

“A friend referred me to a technician who promised to increase the hatch rate of my incubator from 50 to 80 per cent. After adjusting temperature and humidity readings, I parted with Sh5,000.

Twenty one days later, I went to open the incubator and out of 1,800 eggs, I got one chick only,” she lamented.

After hearing Angela’s story, I asked my technician to check if the calibration for the temperature and humidity readings for my machine were correct.

STERILISE THE INCUBATOR

He said the readings were fluctuating and he replaced two limit switches. Automatic incubators have a set temperature at 37.8 degrees Celsius and humidity of 60 during the first 18 days (three days to hatching).

The temperature and humidity are then adjusted to 37.5 degrees Celsius and 70 respectively from day 19 to 21.

He also placed a hatcher test although he later removed it because it left no space for putting the chicks after day 18. He also recommended that I sterilise the incubator which I did using surgical spirit.

After assuring me everything was fine, I placed another set of eggs but the hatch rate was barely 10 per cent.

At this point, I lost my patience and demanded a refund for the money I had used to buy the machine. Two weeks later, I received a call from Wells Fargo asking for directions to my residence. “We have a delivery, please give us directions to your house,” the person said.

“What is it?” I asked perplexed. “A 2,000 egg-capacity hatching machine,” he said.

I thought this was an early April Fools’ Day joke, but after enquiring, I considered this a fair settlement deal from the supplier who had sold me the machine that had been giving me trouble for months.

He told me I could use the new machine in the meantime and if I was satisfied with it, we could “negotiate” the price.

I was excited and quickly took more orders from farmers for day-old chicks, including Kennedy who placed an order for 200 chicks and paid a deposit of Sh10,000 upfront.

But there was one little problem. They say the devil is always in the details. Although we managed to get the machine into the house, it was too big to fit through the door leading to the outside veranda, which is practically the only location I can fit an incubator. I tried placing it in the sitting room but the noise from the fan was unbearable.

My wife, although supportive of my poultry adventures, was categorical on this one, “either the machine goes, or I go”. My son, Baraka, and daughter, Amani, seemed to be in agreement because they could barely listen to their favourite cartoons with the noise in the background.

DEMAND TO BE REIMBURSED

I realised that this was a war I was not destined to win anytime soon. I decided to call the supplier again to demand to be reimbursed the full cost I incurred to purchase the faulty machine.

His text message shocked me. “Your machine is beyond repair and will never perform optimally again. All the parts are compromised from the motor windings, sensors, limit switches and styrofoam body. All these are a result of overheating since you left the incubator without water. Source for another one to save costs.”

He also slapped a bill of Sh3,000 for replacing the fan and Sh1,000 for labour. I refused to pay. He has never responded to my text messages.

What surprised me was why for the four months, he undertook repairs on the machine and assured me everything was in order. I also wondered how he reached the conclusion that the machine was kaput without undertaking a final assessment.

Beaten, a month ago, I decided to start out-sourcing incubation services from another farmer who had assured me that his machine hatches 80 per cent of eggs.

Although I was required to pay Sh20 for every egg, the results have been equally disappointing. For the last batch I sent him, out of 216 eggs, I only got 10 chicks.

If I had sold the eggs instead, I would have made at least Sh4,320 to offset the cost for feeds.

At this juncture, you probably expect me to proffer solutions to all the incubator challenges I have recounted. I will disappoint you.

For now, I have gone back to Kalro and placed an order for 300 day-old chicks. They promised to deliver in three months, but the last time I made an order in 2013, they took 11 months to deliver.

Another farmer told me in confidence that incubators imported from Europe are more expensive but reliable. I remain hopeful.

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Dr Obwogo is a farmer and a medical doctor. He works as a senior quality improvement advisor in health policy and systems strengthening with an international NGO.