I know I already commented a while ago on this system but I feel I need to let anyone else who is building their first incubator know this is totally legit. I followed Garrett's instructions as he says in this video and it works great. So much easier and cheeper than other heat tape versions and it is a much better way to retain stable heat and humidity. Think about it, if you open the door to an incubator the whole system has to kick back on and try and level itself out again and there has to be hot and cold spots because you are dealing with air not water. I can't thank you enough for sharing this, it's one of the best pieces of advise I've gotten since starting this hobby.

I used just the smallest circulation pump I could find, I believe it was from Aqueon- but any aquarium pump will do. Humidity in this system always stays at or close to 100%, which is why you can use drier substrate and be fine. The temperature will depend on the species you are trying to incubate, and only needs to be monitored inside the egg chamber. For ball pythons, for example, that temperature should be around 88 degrees. It doesn’t matter what the water temperature is, or the air temperature in the rest of the cooler- the only one that matters is that egg box internal temperature. The heaters are adjusted slightly, then after a couple of hours the egg boxes are checked again, and so on until the correct temperature is reached. For this reason, I recommend setting the system up weeks in advance, and getting it all dialed in. Then you can feel free to unplug it until it is needed.

I had a friend back in the 80's who would put the egg boxes on top of a refrigerator for the heat that would rise. Funny as it sounds it did work. Now that is old school!

That is by far the best system I've seen yet, I was just about to go buy an old drinks cooler and convert it but I like this way better.

That water heating system is genius! Thank you so much for this video!

Been using this the last few years, couple different coolers as I had more clutches, works awesome, humidity is perfect, no mold, no worries, solid, thanks for the idea!

I learn so much from you. Thank you for sharing all of you tips an tricks. Your a great teacher, an a cool guy.

This video just made my 1st breeding season so much easier, thank you

Finally a system I truly like.

very nice tutorial video, greetings from Indonesia reptile lovers

This is incredibly helpful! Thank you.

I love the old school ideas! Now to find me some big coolers!

You are brilliant, love this, if you buy a already made fancy incubator it will cost an arm and a leg, build one yourself with a whine cooler you have so much work this seems practically, and simple enough anyone can do it. Thank you so much for sharing and best wishes always..😊👍

Dude that's genius! I love it.

Nice. I've never seen an incubator like this. I may try something like this. thanks a lot for doing this vid.

Thanks so much for this I'm getting ready to start breeding Beardie's and this helps me alot.

Fantastic info here! Thank you so much! Helped me a lot!

Love the incubator idea 👍👍

This is a great set up gonna be building one for sure!

I know this is an old video . But great non the less . This will be my first incubated .

As always, genius. Your videos are wonderful.

Richard Bilbo sent me here. 🤙 mahalo

I'm going to try that one out. Great job.

Thank you a lot, this looked really simple!

i love this setup really MacGiver type stuff. i just wish a company would make larger 60 gallon tubs or larger clutches. .

Awesome method...

Thank you for the video! This is very helpful! I am scrambling to save some gecko eggs thati found in my wall: landlord will want to call an exterminator and get rid of them! I have a friend that has a tropical paradise in his backyard and will never get exterminated!!

This is such a cool idea! How do you prevent things like mold with such a high humidity though?

This is the best diy incubater but instead of using circulation pump can you use a fan like how some breeders do for wine cooler and think you I whack both incubation vids this is what I’m going to use for my first ball phthon pairing 😀🤝👍🏾

what temperature do you keep them at?

Smart!

I'm thinking about doing a smaller version of this for fat-tailed gecko eggs. Are you sure there is no need to keep the substrate wet? This seems like a really cool method, but I want to make sure it'll work for my type of eggs.

So how are you checking the egg temps inside of the actual egg boxes since thats counts most?

Old school. Love it.

How much water do u put in the box with the eggs and also do you have to keep adding water to the egg box and the cooler also?

Posted 7 yrs ago and i just stumbled to it just now. 2024.

What has been your success rate with this method? I'm a new amateur hobbyist, breeding is going well and the excitement is super high. I only have one breeding pair, therefore, one clutch one. I'm just worried about reliability and need to rest assured that this is reliable.

Thank we are breeding lepard geckos and this this is best by far video the other videos are too confusing

My extremely gravid beardie thanks you for this video lol

Do you still use this same setup to this day or have you found/built a more reliable method of incubation?

Thank you

Great idea. A couple of questions: 1) Elec. wires: did you drill holes for them or just pass them under the lid? 2) Ventilation holes, are they required? And if so, do they go all the way through the lid and sides or are they only limited to the internal layer?

Great DIY video question is this good for ball python eggs ?

4 years later.....I'm building one of these for my bearded dragons 👍

What is that White substrate?? Like your idea!

I made something similar I bought 50 watt but that was too small so I went back and got a hundred and fifty Watt submersible water heater I'm looking for the Little Rock Stone to put the eggs on

You are cool af man thank you

I wonder if this would work for leopard gecko eggs

very nice, and practical incubator setup. how many watts is your aquarium heater?

What temp do you set the thermostats at in the water Garett?

do you put anything around it or in the lid? when they hatch will they push the lid up?

I'm assuming that you don't have some sort of redundant battery/generator backup because the cooler provides enough insulation so that temperatures will remain stable for a few hours or so during a power outage. I've heard stories of breeders losing entire clutches due to random power outages that caused the incubators to lose heat and thus their eggs.

Excuse me my gecko eggs are denting at. 2 weeks but they are still red. The bottom looks moist when I pick it up. By the way I am using a makeshift incubator. The incubator is just a deli cup on top of a heat mat. Some reason the temperature fluctuates from 83 degrees Fahrenheit to 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Right now they are at 86.4 degrees

great job..keep it up

Im going to breed my western hognoses but is this good for the hognose eggs? Just making sure 😊

Woke up this morning at 12 and found out that my one corn snake was not a male but a female I really hope this self-made incubator work for me but my question is how do you keep the Heat going

How are your successes using this incubator? I'm planning to use your idea but with styro cooler since normal coolers here are so expensive. Thank you!

Neato.

what temperature do the bearded dragon eggs have to be on?

Can I use this method for my Indian Star tortoises eggs to successfully hatch them ?

Genius

How much temparature should be in side box 32 or 34

I’m thinking about doing this for my first clutch. What kind of aquarium water heater should I be looking for?

The eggs are fertile I have candle them you can see the outline of the baby lizard inside the eggs and I feel like I need to hatch him and let him go because I disturb them not meaning to but I would like for them not to die because I got in

Vermiculite or fan you use perlite?

Hi can this use for crested gecko also? Tq

So I just built this because I have a clutch of ball python eggs. I have almost everything set the same but my temperature won’t decrease even if I lower the water heaters, it keeps getting to 100 degrees but I need it at 88. I have the heaters set at 79 but it still seems pretty warm. Is there anything I can do to make the temperature lower? I’ve been playing with the heaters and the pump. The humidity is great it’s at 99% but my problem is the temperature

what temperature do you try and keep the water at?

What happens if I feed my corn snake chicken meat?

I have this set up, but my problem is mold, constantly. I have to wipe the eggs down pretty much daily, even with an anti fungal powder, any advice?

Great video I am from India we have don't much expertise when it comes to turtle can u please make a video on how to handle turtle eggs when they are laid And ways and tips on how to tell that those eggs are fertile....

I found six baby lizard eggs in my garden in my potting soil and I brought them into raise them because I scared the dad off but I didn't know that there were eggs in there when I shoot him out of the bucket and I used all of the potting soil for my garden so I brought the eggs up to my upstairs bedroom I put them in some of the potting soil they were already in covered them with more inside them outside on my balcony in the Sun but I would like to put them in an incubator of some sort and I need to know how to make an incubator for baby lizard eggs I can't think of what they're called but they're the real pretty striving ones with the dark blue or the light blue the real pretty blue tell anybody got any ideas

On the aquarium heaters how many watts do they have to be? I got a 120qt Coleman cooler. Not sure if it would work the same way but thought it would be worth a shot

What should be the humidity percentage for Mediterranean tortoise eggs within the perlite>?Thank you in advance

Hi bro. My name is Terrylaz from malaysia. Due to climate in malaysia is warm 30 to 32C. I need to know if i use vermiculite in the process of incubation ...do i have to dampen the vermiculite weekly during the incubation process? Some ppl do not make any hole in the container and some do...like airtight.

Hey man! Was working outside today doing a tree job. And cut the tree down to find there was 14 snake eggs that were almost crushed. So grabbed them out them in about 3 inches of molch and barely covered them up, also got them in a little plastic thing with a lid, tons and tons of air flow, what else should I do to make sure theses baby’s hatch and get put back into the wild ?

Should work great for ball python eggs? Love these video. I need my temp at 88 degrees so set water temp around 86-87?

What if you need the humidity to be less than 100%? Would I just add less water?

Hey bud not sure if you still respond to comments but I brought a fox snake home from a spot it was going to be killed and now I have about 7 eggs. Right now they are next to my turtle heat lamp, inside a bin, with aspen packed around them lightly. I had no time to rig anything up before work. I might try your setup when I get home. Have you ever heard of people setting the bins on top of their water heaters? Do you think that would work ? What causes eggs to collapse? Ive seen a few people failed that way just wondering what causes that? thanks for any information

I love this vid but I'm looking for what to do when the eggs begin to hatch in the incubator do i leave them until they all hatch how long do they have to be with the egg or is it just until the yolk is gone? This is my first clutch ever ! Ahhhh

my question is for incubation if albino red eared sliders and diamondback terrapin incubation, what temperature should I set the water thermometers for? would I set them at 78 degrees? that's the temp I want the incubator temp to be. I am incubating for male. I guess my question is is the inside temp the same temp that I set the water thermometers to be? or do u need to play with them temp wise to get that temp?

Where can i find the same heater because i don't want to buy something and have to buy a second part to go with it.

Will this work for Russian/Horsefield tortoise 🐢???

What were those boxes that fit the cooler perfectly called? And where would I get them? I’ve been scouring the web to help start my snake breeding business and this looks like an incredible, cost effective, space saving way to incubate eggs!

Anyone have a good substrate you don't have to rinse? I don't have two weeks to let it dry

Hey, can I use gravel in aquariums instead of the prolite for the incubator

nice bro.. i dig ur set up..

Good video

Hi! I know this was a while ago, but in two years, I'm gonna breed my bearded dragons. Unfortunately, I couldn't find an adult female of what I want to breed so I had to get a baby and it's gonna have to be a while. Could you leave links to what you used? I don't want anything to go wrong so I want to get exactly what you did.

Can I put my box turtle eggs in a closet for humanity if I don’t have incubator with eco-earth substrate

Can this be used for chameleons?

Hi , will this work for leopard gecko eggs?

I haven’t found any information on what the humidity is supposed to be at for bearded dragons for the incubator if anyone knows

see i dont have a snake but im thinking about getting one so whats do these do for the eggs ? or is this how they gotta be hatched

What temp the heater is set and what temp of the cooler i will maintain to hatch my lizard egg thanks in advance

Hi. Quick question on this. To get accurate stable temps inside the cooler I presume it would be better to have this situated in a different room to the heated snake room??

Another question that I have should I spray the eggs with water or do I not want to spray them

Hopefully you still the comments section of this video. My question is, does this system work for bearded dragons as well? Ive been doing my research and found they need 75% humidity and I'm worried about excess humidity.

Wait what if iam trying to hatch chameleon eggs

Thanks for the video bud