HELP! Received Mildewed Hatching Eggs UPDATED- We have chicks!

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BeccaOH

BeccaOH

Morning Gem Farm
11 Years
Oct 3, 2008
1,287
5
161
east central Ohio
I got eggs from TX (I'm in OH) that took 7-8 days to reach me (depending on how you look at the calendar). Picked them up from the PO yesterday morning. They were in a large Priority Mail flat rate box.
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Just talked to my mailman, and he said there is not guarantee on Priority Mail, routes and times vary, and I should contact the seller.
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at PO.

Finally at midnight last night I got around to unwrapping each egg. Seller had packed them very well. Didn't look justled at all. I'm heartsick, though, that each egg has mildew growing on it. I took pictures (can't load them yet), and now I'm trying to decide if and how to wash them. Do I even risk incubating, or would they all be rotten?
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24 beautiful Blue Marans
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I would get a paper towel soak it in a bleach solution, wring it out, pat it semi dry with a dry cloth and when you have a towel that is just over the edge from dry (but wet enough to keep a little bleach in it), wipe the eggs down and then incubate them. Couldn't hurt right?

Worst that can happen is they won't develop.

With that much time elapsed they could already be cooked in this weather anyway.
 
I would definitely check with the seller, no matter what. The PO may not be able to insure mail, but if you bought off eBay or something there should be some sort of buyer protection. If you got from eBay, the product you got was DEFINITELY not the product you bid on, AND it didn't get there in a timely manner. Unless there were MAJOR pitfalls in the shipping route, it shouldn't have taken more than 3 days to get to you; I can ship to Cali from Michigan in under 3 days using flat rate mailing. Regardless of what I think may have happened with shipping, the eggs should NEVER have arrived at your doorstep with mildew all over them. If I were you, I would be talking to the seller asking the eggs to be re-sent if there was any sort of arrival guarantee (like that they would arrive unbroken) It's unreasonable to expect a guarantee in hatch rate or fertility, but a lot of people will guarantee the eggs will at least arrive safely (or replace the ones that don't).

If there was no guarantee like that made, then you've learned a valuable lesson about buying from people who refuse to make that sort of guarantee. Unfortunate, but there it is. Best of luck, I hope that there's hope for this clutch despite their unfortunate hazards.
 
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It is not the seller's responsibility to make sure the PO gets the eggs to you on time. Once they leave the seller's hands, the guarantee ends for most sellers. It would be ridiculous to expect a seller to constantly replace eggs due to the PO errors or mishandling. Many sellers will work with a buyer and send replacement eggs for shipping costs but it certainly isn't a requirement.

I can't imagine why they were mildewed unless they were wrapped while either too cool or the box got wet. The wrapping is definitely the responsibility of the seller.
 
I recently shipped something to Hawaii and it got there in 3 days. But I shipped eggs to western TN, (I'm in eastern TN) and it took 5 days!

I got eggs from a BYC'r yesterday that were wet and sticky. None of the eggs were broken and the time lapse between her sending them to me and me getting them was 3 days. It's the humidity and definitely NOT the seller's fault.

One thing that I'm doing to prevent this from happening is the way I wrap eggs. If the eggs is completely enclosed in bubble wrap, it can't breathe.

Here's my method of wrapping. And I have to add that I've had only one broken egg out of 113 shipments of eggs also. Both the top and bottom are open for breathability.

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Internet is so unreliable for me on weekends.
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Thanks for all the replies. I did photograph the eggs, but I forgot to upload the pictures.
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I did wipe them with a very lightly dampened papertowel. I didn't use bleach because that made me nervous. It was hard to get them to look "clean" though. And I went ahead and set them. Next big problem will be that I haven't had any luck candling Maran eggs and most of these are quite dark. So I can't really watch to see if they are duds, developing, or turning black with rot.
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The ebay seller has been nice and understanding. I really don't blame her. She'll ship new eggs for cost of shipping if the hatch is awful. I think I'd wait until at least September to try shipping again, though, due to weather.

I have received duck eggs wrapped like that, TNTruly. They came through just fine -- though I'm still not getting much development from them.
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I see I never uploaded the pictures of the eggs I took.
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But I have an update. Out of 24 eggs I have only culled 8. Definite development going on in many. Some of have been too dark shelled to properly candle, so 16 eggs have made it into my hatcher.
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If I even hatch half of those out of severely mildewed eggs, I'll be happy -- and shocked.
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Here's to a good weekend.
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Hopefully I'll have (and remember to post) chick pictures on Monday!
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Out of these eggs, I've gotten 4 chicks. There are still eggs in the hatcher, but I think things are about done. When I first saw/smelled these eggs, I never thought I'd get one to hatch, so 4 is great. Seemed that they also came right on 21 days, so they weren't already developing in the box.

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