guinea eggs in the cold....

[critters]

I am wondering if eggs laid during the evening
will freeze? if the temps are too cold can/will it
freeze the eggs so they can't be incubated?? I
live in Virginia and my guinea's are laying (yea!)
but it has been cold, like last night it was 25*....
they have a heat lamp in their coop but still...

so if I collect the eggs will they still be ok to incubate??

 

[Silkie Chick]

I did a little research and it looks as though if the eggs get too much below 50 F that they won't hatch. If one of your fowl goes broody you should be able to place the eggs under her and she should be able to keep them warm enough (but frozen eggs will definitely not hatch). Maybe you could collect them as soon as they are laid so you they won't get too cold. Sorry if this is bad news.

 

[PeepsCA]

Some have hatched refrigerated Guinea eggs before with a decent amount of success, but I doubt if they freeze over night they will be viable, and no way if they freeze solid. Best you can do is collect eggs before you go to bed and first thing in the morning

I imagine the frozen solid eggs would still work fine for cooking/baking tho.

 

[KrisH]

There is a thread somewhere on BYC about hatching the fertilized chicken eggs from "Trader Joes" grocery store. Grocery stores are required to keep eggs below 45°F. bet frozen eggs would be another story
RobertH

 

[critters]

it appears that a couple guinea hens are sitting on their little clutch
of eggs....they have scooped out a place and have the eggs centered
with several hens stayin on or close...this area has cover for them too..
..they are in a pen and at this point are not aloud to go out
with the free rangers.....I had added some younger ones so they stay
in for now...
.maybe their body heat would help keep the eggs from
freezing?..if they sit on the eggs instead of roosting...
.I check on them when I feed at sunset, when I am
putting the chickens up and my final feeding for the day of the ducks...
then I check on them first thing in the morning with first rounds of
feeding and the day begins......

 

[PeepsCA]

Unless they Hens are continuously keeping the eggs warm (brooding them) the embryos will start to develop inside the eggs, then stop and die if they get cold. And of course, those eggs won't hatch. If they get warmed to 70 degrees they start developing. Sometimes you can get away with some initial development and still have viable eggs, but the starting and stopping a few days in a row usually kills an embryo pretty quickly. It's still pretty cold and pretty early for Hens to go broody and hatch out keets, the keets won't be able to stay warm enough (without you providing a heat source or scooping them up as soon as they hatch and raise them in a brooder), if they even hatch at all. IMO, if you really want some keets this early you are better off collecting the fresh eggs at least twice daily and storing them at about 55 degrees steady (like in a closet) if possible until you have enough collected to incubate. Keep in mind eggs older than 10 days lose their viability quickly, even if stored properly.You also need to tilt or turn the eggs AM and PM to keep the blastoderm from adhering to the egg membrane. A lot of things contribute to egg viability and a decent hatch rate.. but proper egg storage and handling before incubating is always a plus.

 

[critters]

thanks all.....appreciate your time!!