How to Make Your Own Incubator at Home

Incubators allow you to provide an environment with steady warmth and humidity, helping facilitate the incubation and hatching of eggs. Ideally, an incubator should allow adjustment of both humidity and temperature, and to also keep the interior area at those levels indefinitely. Thankfully, because it's simple to make an incubator, you don't have to spend thousands on a commercial model.

Things You'll Need

  • 20-gallon fish tank
  • 2 to 3 lbs. of sawdust
  • 2 100-watt heat lamps
  • 2 100-watt heat lamp bulbs
  • 2 50-watt heat lamp bulbs
  • Bread loaf pan
  • Water
  • Large sponge
  • Thermometer
  • Hygrometer
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Instructions

    • 1

      Set up your fish tank near an available wall outlet, placing it in an area where room temperatures are reasonably steady throughout both the day and the night. Be sure that the area is draft-free if possible.

    • 2

      Place enough sawdust into the bottom of the fish tank so that the entire floor is covered with about 1 inch from one end to the other. Lay a thermometer and a hygrometer near the center so they may be easily read when you take measurements.

    • 3

      Fill the bread pan 1/2 full of water and place the large sponge in the center, allowing it to become saturated with water. Place the bread pan with sponge between the thermometer and the hygrometer.

    • 4

      Install 100-watt heat lamp bulbs into your heat lamp fixtures and then clamp them to the fish tank, one on each end, with the bulbs facing inward and aimed toward the center of the tank. Plug the lamps in and turn them on.

    • 5

      Take hourly temperature and humidity readings of your incubator and write the readings down on a piece of paper. The hygrometer will display humidity levels. Continue making readings once every hour until both the temperature and humidity have stabilized.

    • 6

      Adjust the heat lamps by aiming them further outward in small increments until the internal temperature of your incubator is at the level necessary for your chosen eggs and animal type. If the temperature needs to be lowered more than the adjustments permit, change out the bulbs and use 50-watt bulbs instead. After swapping bulbs, begin the process all over by aiming the lamps toward the center and adjusting them outward in small increments until the desired temperature has been achieved.

    • 7

      Trim off 1 inch at a time from the sponge until the desired humidity level is achieved. Trimming the sponge reduces the water evaporation levels in the tank, reducing the humidity level.