Runny yolk in incubator

[Tiny Egg]

Hi! I’m on day 3 of incubating my first quail eggs. I took one out to candle it (I know it’s too early, I’m sorry I couldn’t wait) and I noticed it had a crack, so I took it to the kitchen to do an eggtopsy to see if it was fertilized and to see what I could see.
The yolk was completely runny. I also couldn’t find the bullseye or non-bullseye-looking circle, even after looking up at the bottom of the glass. I wish I had thought to take a picture but I threw it out. Next time I’ll be sure to take a picture.
I guess my question is, do you think this means the egg wasn’t fertilized at all? Was it shaken too much during shipping (which took four days in freezing or near freezing temperatures)? Or did it die too early to form an embryo? Maybe the crack let in some bacteria? It didn’t smell at all. Or is a runny yolk like that completely normal in an egg thats been in the incubator? I’m pretty worried that it could mean the rest of the eggs will be in the same boat.

 

[Susan Skylark]

You should have seen a blood spot or embryo on a fertile day 3 egg. Yolks get ‘delicate’ after a couple days in the incubator, it isn’t uncommon to rupture one when opening a bum egg. The crack would have been an issue whatever happened, bacterial contamination is certainly a possible side effect but in quail eggs I’ve had more trouble with dehydration (the embryo gets dessicated) than rotten eggs with cracks I fail to notice.

 

[Tiny Egg]

You should have seen a blood spot or embryo on a fertile day 3 egg. Yolks get ‘delicate’ after a couple days in the incubator, it isn’t uncommon to rupture one when opening a bum egg. The crack would have been an issue whatever happened, bacterial contamination is certainly a possible side effect but in quail eggs I’ve had more trouble with dehydration (the embryo gets dessicated) than rotten eggs with cracks I fail to notice.

And the blood spot would have been very noticeable, right? Not easy to miss in a fertilized egg?

 

[Nabiki]

If the egg was cracked, it probably never began to develop even if it was fertile.