I never wash my eggs i incubate , i may wipe them off if they got some poo stuck to them and i have never had a hatching problem, heck my guineas, geese, ducks,chickens don't wash their eggs and they have a very high hatch rate no quitters unless they get rotated in and out of the nest, so i figured if they don't need to wash them than neither do i, there is a film on the egg to protect the embryo so why take a chance and wash that off and allow the bacteria to enter
Perhaps some of the hatching problems folks have beside the scrambled eggs from shipping is due tithe fact that the eggs have been washed
I have seen eggs hatch just fine in a hens nest after an egg has gotten broken on the others so that tells me to leave them alone and let that membrane do what it is suppose to.
Zaz, I think you make good points. I am not sure what is so different about using an incubator... maybe the humidity and it encourages droplets of moisture to form on the eggs? Honestly, an incubator is like the perfect growth environment for bacteria... maybe because there is so much more moisture? That film or bloom sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. What level of humidity are you running in your incubators? I keep mine very high here, because with the altitude, the eggs naturally tend to dry out faster than eggs being hatched closer to sea level. Altitude definitely creates a more difficult hatching environment.
But from all the reading I did, it looks like the commercial hatcheries do disinfect their eggs... I don't think those folks would be spending the money on an extra step if it weren't making a difference. It is apparently important in trying to eradicate salmonella from the food chain to the extent that can be done. They are also not even supposed to start incubating eggs with visible fecal matter on them, if what I read is correct...
I'm not sure why I've had so many quitters last summer, and some in these eggs... while others appear to be developing fine. There could be something "wrong" or that went wrong in that egg, but the most obvious explanation to me is bacteria. Wish I had the tools to tell. When I'm past the date on some of them, I think I will open them up and see if there is anything visible... wish I had a microscope or some way to measure bacterial counts....
One of the things that I discovered when I researched it was that temperature matters. Specifically,
RELATIVE temperature matters. We are talking about a permeable shell and permeable membranes below the shell, and then a fluid-filled sac inside. It matters whether the egg is warmer or colder than the air or liquid around it.
When the egg is COOLER than the fluid around it, the fluid inside the egg warms up and expands, which can push some fluids OUT through the pores in the shell.
When the egg is WARMER that the fluid (including air) around it, the fluid inside the egg contracts, and can draw stuff from outside the egg through the pores to inside the shell, such as bacteria, which then infect the developing embryo and can cause it to die, or to be born with a mushy navel.
That is why they say to disinfect the eggs as quickly as possible -- before lots of external bacteria are drawn inside, which can happen immediately after the egg is laid -- and that if the eggs are going to be immersed in a disinfectant solution, that the solution should be WARMER than the egg. I think I read that the solution should be at 105 - 110 degrees F, not hot enough to damage the egg, but warmer that the egg so it doesn't get drawn inside.
I read other stuff (older) that suggested with some disinfectants, getting through the pores might help kill bacteria that were previously drawn in when the egg first started cooling. There's a lot of stuff out there, and I haven't read it all....
I'm still trying to figure out what is the best way to do this for a hobbyist... I can't justify buying a big commercial egg washer/disinfection set up. I'm still not clear on what would be the best chemicals to use... apparently plain old bleach (if I can figure out the correct concentration), hydrogen peroxide and "quats" all will work, if applied correctly.
I thought there wasn't an egg last night, but found it this morning, so it got cold, but I don't think it froze, quite. It was either laid really late, or it was hidden by Peanut's train when I checked the last time. The hen put it in a different place than usual.
I retrieved it this morning, and went ahead and wet it down with peroxide. At room temperature, the peroxide was significantly warmer than the egg. I let it stand with wet peroxide on it for a couple minutes, then stuck it in the incubator (these eggs are all staggered and will hatch who knows when, if any of them do). I'll see what happens.
My thought is to do a few with peroxide, and then maybe a few with bleach or quats, if I can figure out appropriate concentrations, and see whether I can tell a difference between disinfected eggs and not-disinfected eggs, and perhaps between outcomes with the different disinfectants. Unfortunately, my sample size will be too small to really run a scientific test, but I've lost so many eggs at this point that I feel like I need to at least try.
I'd be glad to hear other folks' thoughts on this... still trying to figure it out myself
