How cold can eggs get before you set them?

[smoothmule]

I found a guinea nest out by the road today and I have 2 little hens wanting to set so I thought I'd let them set some guinea eggs. It was really cold out last night, and I mean below freezing. I do not think the guinea hen was sitting on them last night because all of them (4) but one were really cold. The last one was warm and likely laid today.
Any chance these cold eggs could still hatch out or should I toss them? I've never had much luck figuring out if guinea eggs were fertile since they are so dense so I've just hoped for the best and done pretty well. I have a couple more guinea eggs that the guineas laid in with my chicken eggs in the nesting boxes so even wothout the "cold" eggs, there would be 4 for the little hens to each have a couple, or more if I find some tomorrow too.

I figured to keep them at room temp in the house until I'm ready to set them and these little hens are really wanting to set now.

 

[chickenannie]

Guinea eggs are 28 days to hatch and chickens are 21 days. That might be a reason not to put them under a chicken with mixed eggs. (unless they're all guinea eggs).

 

[smoothmule]

I know that you don't mix the guinea eggs with chicken eggs, I've been picking up the chicken eggs to eat and just wanted to know if there was any chance for the cold guinea eggs to hatch. It might just be better to hunt for more fresh eggs since they're laying all over but I won't know which were exposed to the freezig weather last night. Bummer, the little hens want to set now and they are small so I may try to find some bantam eggs here in Buffalo, Mo. ASAP instead.

Does anyone know a good way to "candle" guinea eggs?

 

[GwenFarms]

I think they would hatch. I have a neighbor who keeps his guinea eggs refridgerated before sitting them to keep the temp constant and they hatch. In fact I have a dozen and a half sitting under a hen now. As long as the hen didn't sit them and then leave the nest they will be fine. I doubt that she was done laying in the nest if there are only four, so she probably hadn't started sitting yet.

 

[smoothmule]

Thanks, I may let them sit these but I'll mark them different. It was extremely cold (25 degrees) though so I was pretty worried they were ruined. We had a couple nights in a row that were that cold. I hate that since I like to collect the guinea eggs from nests in bad spots for them to sit and now I won't know which were laid after the freeze. We lose some of the hens when they set if they aren't close enough for our dogs to keep pests away so I break up the nests when I can find them.

We have a walk in cooler that we use part of the year and it's very insulated. I use it to store feed when we aren't using it and it's turned off and no matter how cold it is outside, it doesn't get below 40 degrees so I store my eggs in a carton in there until I set them.

 

[mswiggi]

If temperatures were below freezing it's doubtful that they'll hatch.

You can try, but don't expect anything.

 

[smoothmule]

Just wanted to post a thank you to those who responded. I felt they should be disposed of but wanted to confirm it before I did. So, rather than make my sweet little hens wait any longer, I went ahead and gave them some eggs to set that my own hens laid. I really have not had the time to go after eggs from someone else's flock.

I have no idea what we'll get since mine are mixed, but I only gave them the larger eggs since I'd like a few more large hens anyway.

Thank you all again, you're great!

 

[cboois94]

Just wanted to post about this. I have successfully hatched 6 chicks that were collected from my coop in the middle of winter. I collected the eggs the first week of Jan after they had sat two nights in the coop.All of them hatched successfully and are healthy 6 day old chicks

I also tried to inccubate eggs that were in the fridge for a week and a half. Out of 8 eggs all but two hatched, Its amazing that these birds can withstand these temperatures

Just wanted to let you know that IT COULD BE DONE