Has anyone ever had bad luck like I am having with online eggs purchased for hatching?

MelissaBA

Chirping
5 Years
Jul 10, 2014
178
4
68
I just bought 18 eggs from ebay about a week and a half ago. I received the eggs and some were really dirty so I cleaned them the best I could. I let them sit for about 8 hours at room temperature before placing them in the incubator which I had already had heated up and ready. On day 7 I candled the eggs and saw NOTHING in NONE of the eggs. I put them back in hoping for the best since it was still early. The next morning I got up, one of the eggs had cracks all around it and was oozing out gunk! I pulled it and discarded it. I candled again while I was in there and still saw absolutely nothing! Has anyone had this bad of an experience with online purchased eggs? I bought them from what seemed to be a reputable person. I wonder if the eggs were even fertile or did I just have bad luck. I am so disappointed. Is there anything I could have done differently?
 
I just bought 18 eggs from ebay about a week and a half ago. I received the eggs and some were really dirty so I cleaned them the best I could. I let them sit for about 8 hours at room temperature before placing them in the incubator which I had already had heated up and ready. On day 7 I candled the eggs and saw NOTHING in NONE of the eggs. I put them back in hoping for the best since it was still early. The next morning I got up, one of the eggs had cracks all around it and was oozing out gunk! I pulled it and discarded it. I candled again while I was in there and still saw absolutely nothing! Has anyone had this bad of an experience with online purchased eggs? I bought them from what seemed to be a reputable person. I wonder if the eggs were even fertile or did I just have bad luck. I am so disappointed. Is there anything I could have done differently?

Well, unfortunately it's hard to find out for sure with your situation. There are many variables. The percentage of success with shipped eggs is less than 50 %.. First thing that comes to mind from the facts you provided is the cleanliness of the eggs. Anyone who is in the business of shipping hatching eggs generally do not, and should not ship dirty eggs. It's just not good business. It is also a reflection of his hygiene of his birds and coops. One or two with a little dirt is one thing, but you say that the eggs were really dirty. Strike one. Next, if you aggressively cleaned the eggs, you may have removed the bloom of the egg, which allows for the entry of any bacteria left on the egg, perhaps strike two. Another thing that is hard to of course know is if the eggs were even viable at all. Fertility and quality of the eggs themselves is an unknown. Did you candle the eggs before you set them? Was there displaced or ruptured air cells? This is perhaps one of the biggest things that effects the viability of shipped eggs.

Is your incubator in fine working order? If so, the fertility of the eggs seem to be a question to have all those clears. One should definitely see some veining at 7-10 days. Perhaps you should research some local breeders/chicken owners where you can pick up eggs and take away the risk of damage to the air cells during shipping. I would buy 6 more than the amount you want, and crack them open and check for fertility. The very first eggs I set with my little incubator was with my flocks own eggs laid that morning. Out of the 7 eggs set, 6 hatched. Since then I have tried 6 more times, with varying success, all with shipped eggs.

Don't give up on shipped eggs. Research the boards here, there are tons of people offering hatching eggs and you can ask other members of their successes in relation to the sellers eggs with the way they were packed, success of hatching, and viability of the chicks when they were born. Of course, it is not the responsibility of the seller to assure hatching rates, as they have no control once the eggs leave their possession, but good, successful reviews of their eggs is a good place to start. A member here who I have received two shipments from was wonderful, and I hatched 5 of 7 with a breed that can be difficult to hatch in an incubator.

Good Luck, and I hope you have some better luck next time! Let us know!

MB
 
Hi MelissaBA,


Don't give up on shipped eggs...
Melabella gave you great advice...
As for me, my first experience hatching was with local eggs and I got an 87% hatch rate.
My second experience is still brewing in the bator...day 14 as we 'speak'...it all started when I was connected to a fellow BYC'er through another BYC'er and she shipped me eggs from CO to OH. Even though I 'swore' I would NEVER do shipped eggs! Couldn't stand the thought of what you have gone through, like many others here.
I had a fit when those eggs arrived at the P.O.! The box looked like it had been used in a football punter's try-out from hell! When I opened the box one egg was cracked 50 ways from Sunday.
I thought it was 'over' right then and there.
With all the negative out of the way...I expected this to be a possibility...I did exhaustive research and when I felt confident with that, I did some more exhaustive research.
So, I knew what to expect from shipped eggs...
MPO is that is well worth the risk. If you do your homework then all you are doing is upping your odds for a successful hatch rate.
There is a thread on here that I highly recommend and it's by Sally Sunshine...
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/704328/diary-notes-air-cell-detatched-shipped-eggs
Keep digging, YouTube is also an excellent resource for you to view, for example, what 'wonky' air-cells look like and what people did to combat the evil that is called USPS (or bad Sellers)
((or both)).
Back to 'homework'.
Under the Learning Center there is a plethora of information to get you back on your toes and headed for success. (And) just so ya know...
even the most experienced Hatchers will run into a zero rate with hatching shipped eggs...it is always a risk...but the jackpot is never far off.
My experience tells me so.
Out of the 8 eggs I received from Kierstens, one was cracked from P.O. Punter and one was infertile...after one week I lost one to the dreaded 'red ring' of death...even though I used 'surgical' precision in handling and incubating my eggs. After all that, I am on the last 'leg' of this shipped egg, second incubation, and as of this afternoon I still have 5 viable, kicking, bouncing chicks in my 'bator!
Right there, the Breeder and I have (at the moment) beaten the 'you know what' out of that 50% 'rule'. I personally am tickled a few shades of pink over that alone.
Though I cannot, should not, and will not count my chicks before they hatch (or after, for that matter), I also will not look a gift chicken in the mouth, so to speak!
I know how depressing it is to go through what you did and get what seems like nothing in return, but as many here will tell you, it's all a learning curve.
Like the commercials that annoyingly tell you, "The More You Know"...
In hatching eggs it will probably always be as it has always been; you'll win some and you will lose some.
Usually the odds work enough in your favor that you will keep going back and giving it another go.
I hope.
Oh, and whatever you don't see in the learning center will usually always be for the asking in these threads here that are aplenty...seek and ye should be able to find someone with both the knowledge and the experience to answer your inquiries...
DON'T GIVE UP!
Your hard work will pay off...







P.S. I just got a 'batch' of Isbars today that I 'won' from an eBay Seller, and they came in all the way from TEXAS!
None were broken (so far, so good) and I will verify air-cells, any hairline cracks and/or any other anomalies by tomorrow morning when they go for their weigh-in...I am already getting excited!
This is better than playing any slot machine...I will take a pay-off in 'Fuzz Butts' any day of the week!

Best wishes for your second go-round...we'll be here for ya!
 
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Thanks so much for all the advice. I did not candle the eggs before I put them in because honestly, I don't know what to look for on a "new" egg. I have only candled eggs that are already in the stages of incubation. The eggs were pretty dirty and it has to make me wonder if that was my first issue like you said. I didn't scrub to hard because I do know there is something on the outer shell that needs to be there so I didn't do a whole lot of cleaning to them so honestly some of them still have a few spots where they had something on them. Guess I should have just took the chance and totally cleaned them off. Will definitely try my luck again, just not with this seller. Thanks again!
 
Just candled the eggs again this morning, and out of the 18 I only see 2 that MIGHT and I use that word strongly have any kind of development. So disappointed!
 

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