Egg washing myth

[Project Blue]

Earlier I posted about Hydrogen peroxide hatches and again had a few more excellent hatches with very filthy eggs. I'm convinced it's a myth washed eggs don't hatch well. I'm getting more aggressive washing under the sink, wiping with HP soaked paper towels and drenching in hydrogen peroxide. Mostly I'm wetting the eggs with HP which softens the muck and depending on the amount of muck lightly wipe off with HP soaked paper towel or even run under warm sink water then HP as a final rinse. I have 5 incubators going steadily. My hatch rate and health of the chicks is way higher than without washing. So far all the chicks are hatching perfect, no curled toes etc. I've been hatching shipped eggs and home grown eggs for years. I did get infertile eggs and one did go bad, however without hydrogen peroxide the rate of partially developed dead chicks, and early stops has been much much higher. I'm getting no dead chicks. My next group is 12 duck eggs. They were gross when I collected them as it had been raining and some where just plopped out in the muckiest of muck. So far all are staying fresh and should hatch in a few days. I consistently add a small squirt of H.P. to the hydration water and start with a sterilized incubator. I still agree it's best to use clean eggs but would highly recommend spot cleaning poop and mud off those with HP. I really believe bacteria in those spots also incubates in the heat and humidity causing early fetal death. In my case I'm incubating the gross eggs I don't want to give to friends and family to eat. The HP doesn't remove stains making the eggs unappetizing but they are hatching. One thing, the poop on brown eggs when I presoak with HP causes a light spot while cleaning. Blue eggs fade to white in the incubator. All the eggs continue to lighten in the incubator. Again, in the past, I did the recommended lightly scrape of any dirt but never wash hatching eggs. I also got good at hatching weak chicks, keeping ICU chicks alive, and straightening curled toes. Cleaning and using HP I have not had any hatching problems, except one chick that was backward in the egg. That chick came out strong. The first couple of hatches could of been just a statistical glitch, but I'm adding more hatches and testing pretty gross eggs and now am totally convinced washing eggs works. I added a few goose eggs to the mix and will see how they do. So far, I've tried chicken and duck with very good results. No more smelly incubators is also a benefit, especially since my laundry room is also my incubation room. I'm getting 100 percent even in staggered incubators, which is tricky to start with.

 

[BlindLemonChicken]

Does HP get egg yolk off? I had a terrible hatch a few years ago when a hen broke an egg in the nest. I cleaned them as best I could with water and only got one chick out of a dozen eggs

 

[Project Blue]

Does HP get egg yolk off? I had a terrible hatch a few years ago when a hen broke an egg in the nest. I cleaned them as best I could with water and only got one chick out of a dozen eggs

I think so. There's been yellowish stuff, I think some kind of mucous from the laying process. I'm not scrubbing but wiping. I'm wiping because the brownish liquid would just re-dry on the egg and I'm not wanting to use too much HP rinsing even though I get it a dollar a bottle at Walmart. After the eggs get thoroughly moistened with HP then I wipe with a HP wet paper towel. Almost everything slides off pretty easy. I noticed when I first put the HP on it bubbles on some eggs in places, like an infected wound does. I imagine those places just fester in the incubator until it works its way into the sterile chicks growing space creating havoc. Egg yolk is a delightful medium for lots of bugaboos to grow in afteral. I'm experimenting but having amazing results. I would venture to say if you had followed up with HP you might of got a better hatch, though I'm not sure if this would work in a hen's nest verses an incubator where I'm reintroducing small amounts of HP intermittently when I add hydration water.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

I think so. There's been yellowish stuff, I think some kind of mucous from the laying process. I'm not scrubbing but wiping. I'm wiping because the brownish liquid would just re-dry on the egg and I'm not wanting to use too much HP rinsing even though I get it a dollar a bottle at Walmart. After the eggs get thoroughly moistened with HP then I wipe with a HP wet paper towel. Almost everything slides off pretty easy. I noticed when I first put the HP on it bubbles on some eggs in places, like an infected wound does. I imagine those places just fester in the incubator until it works its way into the sterile chicks growing space creating havoc. Egg yolk is a delightful medium for lots of bugaboos to grow in afteral. I'm experimenting but having amazing results. I would venture to say if you had followed up with HP you might of got a better hatch, though I'm not sure if this would work in a hen's nest verses an incubator where I'm reintroducing small amounts of HP intermittently when I add hydration water.

Have you written an article on this? If so, would you please post a link, and if not, would you please consider doing so?

 

[BigBlueHen53]

I know there's also been some discussion about using Odo-Ban on hatching eggs with surprisingly good results. Was that you, as well? That should also be made into an article if it isn't already. I'm very much in favor of washing eggs, whether for eating or hatching, so looking forward to more articles on the subject.

 

[Susan Skylark]

Hydrogen peroxide oxidizes organic material, in small doses it is beneficial in removing organic debris and has some antibacterial activity, too long of an exposure causes damage to fabric, shells, and living tissue (like wounds). Decreasing the organic debris on eggs going into the incubator (by whatever means) is an excellent idea: No organic material means bacteria have a hard time surviving until and lowers the environmental contamination at hatch when chicks are most vulnerable. The lightening of the shells is consistent with peroxide use on substances like fabric or hair. I do find it harder to find a causative relationship (correlation is not causation) between peroxide and less chick deformities, increased hatch rates (unless you previously had a horrible rate of bacterial egg infections), etc. cleaner eggs and less neonatal chick deaths from bacterial causes, makes a ton of sense, but peroxide is not a magic bullet. I have tried inducing intra ova infections by washing/scrubbing/soaking eggs with no success, this combined with an eggs innate defense mechanisms make actual bacterial invasion of eggs with intact shells exceedingly rare (I have a rate of 1 egg out of over 300 incubated and that was cracked!). Cleaning eggs gently but thoroughly preincubation is an excellent idea, peroxide use can be part of that protocol, but saying it magically fixes so many other hatching issues is premature without significantly more data and carefully controlled protocols.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Well, when I am ready to hatch I think I will try a cleansing protocol of Dawn dish soap and Clorox bleach. Now before this curls all y'all's toes, let me hasten to add that I will be using a very MINIMAL amount of these products. We don't really want to mess with Mother Nature very much, now, do we? And I will also say that for the most part my eggs come in from the nests pretty clean. So it's not like I will be dunking and scrubbing every single egg within an inch of its life!