No such thing as a stupid question, right?!

[TabbyG]

I'm new to the chicken world. I've had my 6 RIR's for about 2.5 months now, and recently we added older chickens - 1 speckled sussex, 2 leghorns & a pair of bantams (1 hen & 1 roo). We've been getting eggs from 3 of the girls, 1 small (so I know it's my bantam), 1 large brown (so i know it's coming from my sussex) and 1 big white (so one of my leghorns isn't laying)... however - i just read the thread on what a fertilized egg looks like vs. non-fertile. Now to my questions -

1. i've seen talk about embryos dying - when does that happen and how? we just want the eggs to eat
2. how long can they sit on my counter or in my fridge? will anything happen if they aren't in the incubator or under a hen?

Thanks for the help, haha I feel like such an airhead!!!

 

[thebanthams]

I can keep my eggs on the counter for two to three days, but refridge. is best for them. They can keep almost three weeks !! You can tell if the eggs are bad when eggs floats in water . embryos starts about one to two days when you put in the incubator or hens sitting on it . its almost hard to tell why they die, temperature? or genetics? Backyard chickens is the best to learn from them

 

[TabbyG]

Thanks a bunch - I just had in my mind (this is silly now) that I'd come home one day and have a chicken on the counter cause I didn't know it was fertilized. Like I said, I don't know a lot right now - but I'm getting better, haha.

 

[ailurophile23]

No such thing as a dumb question - it is how we learn. And no - you shouldn't come home to a chicken on the counter - fresh eggs will store are room temp or in the fridge for a while and shouldn't develop if not in an incubator or under a hen. Most folks recommend that, if you intend to hatch the eggs, you should store them for no more than 10 days at room temp - beyond that, they are really unlikely to develop - better success with fresher eggs.

 

[thebanthams]

I agree theres no such thing as dumb questions ! I ask that all the time ! thats what this website is for ! it helps me learn a lot !! So ask as many questions you want we all will be there to help !!

 

[Time-Out]

Just so you know: in the UK, to sell eggs at 'the farm gate', you mustn't refridgerate them and you should date them four weeks from date of lay.
Just goes to show how long you can have eggs sitting around for

 

[CindyJeann]

A fertilized egg has a single cell on the surface of the yolk that is fertilize. The egg must be at 99.5 fahrenheit for that single cell to start to divide and grow. If the egg sits at room temp for more than 10 days the odds that it can divide and grow drop drastically, but an unwashed yet clean egg can sit for weeks at room temp and still be good for eating.

 

[Kedreeva]

"Embryos dying" generally is something that occurs after incubation starts. Incubation doesn't start until you have had the egg sitting in an environment at 99.5 degrees for ~12-24 hours.

What I will caution you about, and what Cindy has stated above, is the washed state of the egg. When a chicken lays an egg, her body leaves a protective mineral coat over the top of it. The egg's shell is actually porous. Air exchanges through the shell when it is left alone- this is an essential property to chicks growing inside the eggs. Commercial egg sellers clean their eggs so that no one buys dirty eggs off the shelves, but the process of cleaning them actually removes this mineral coating and can push bacteria through the shell. Commercial egg sellers re-coat the egg with a mineral coating before shipping them, but it's not as good and honestly the damage has already been done. Those store bought eggs won't last as long as your fresh ones.

So what I will stress is that if you want to leave your eggs out of the fridge after taking them from your hens, don't wash them. If you coop is clean, the eggs should be fairly clean already. If there are hunks of poo or dirt on the eggs, brush them off but don't scrub the eggs. In a cool, dry environment, eggs can be kept out of a fridge for at least 4 weeks- some people have methods of keeping them unrefrigerated that have kept eggs ok to eat for up to 5 months. Some of the local people we sell eggs to have used our eggs at 3 months (refrigerated) and said they were fine.

As another side point- if you don't know how long an egg has been sitting (maybe your hens found a hiding spot to stash eggs... it happens) then you can check if the eggs are good or not by floating them in water. Bad eggs float. If you think your hens have been sitting on eggs and may have started incubation on them, you can candle them by taking them to a dark room and shining a flashlight against the shell- if you see veins inside, or a very dark spot (a light dark round thing is the yolk haha), then the egg may be growing into a chick.