Shipping Heritage Hatching Eggs through the Mail

[Smoky73]

Quote:
I completely agree with trying to get them to ship them as lives, it would help immensely. Thanks for the good words on my RIR's, I rarely show them, and have only had them 2 years. Next year I can actually start selling stock for a change. I think I have about 16 or so females and 2 males. I just love the rich dark color, and they are so well behaved. I got the original eggs from House of Champions, but not sure what breeder they originated from.

 

[kathyinmo]

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I never would have thought of that! I think that is a great idea.

 

[Robert Blosl]

I just had a idea. Cathy use your egg carton method put ten or twelve eggs on each side of a double baby chick box with egg cartons big side up . I have about twenty boxes left from shipping started chicks. Pack them well and ship them may work very well. I will work on it tuesday when I am off see what I can up with.
bob

 

[Katy]

Quote:
I never would have thought of that! I think that is a great idea.

I have thought about doing that.......

 

[Robert Blosl]

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/663293/how_to_pack_hatching_eggs_for_shipping.html?image=242301&cat=53

http://www.poultryhelp.com/eggpacking.html

http://shilala.homestead.com/shippingeggs.html

http://www.rainbowgatefarm.com/ShippingHatchingEggs.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_5400190_ship-hatching-eggs.html

http://www.duckeggs.com/duck_egg_packaging.html

http://www.eggboxes.com/ecom-prodshow/special2.html
http://www.eggboxes.com/ecom-prodshow/special2.html
http://backyardchickens.yuku.com/topic/1530/t/Packing-eggs-for-shipping.html
http://www.picturetrail.com/sfx/album/view/7939567
http://www.hattricksilkies.com/packingeggs.html




I spent some time last night on the internet looking for methods of shipping eggs. I found some duck egg cartons which I could use as they have extra super large holes to cusion the eggs. I found a lady who used saw dust like I did years ago and she got the best results doing this like i did. Also, I think most people get better results if the large ind is up rather than let the egg lay on thier sides. I think the biggest reason eggs dont hatch is air cell damage in the travel from your home to your customer. Shipping in hotor cold weather. One thread was started in the summer. I never ship after may as its to hot. Look it over and lets see if we can come up with other ideas and success stories befor we start shipping the eggs out. Some say dont put eggs on the box. Just fragle. I am going to try to ship in baby chick boxes with saw dust surrounding the egg carton with ten eggs in each side. bob

 

[muddstopper]

I thought I had already posted this, but couldn’t find it. Here is how I pack my eggs for shipping. First I individually bubble wrapp each egg in the small bubble, bubble wrap.

Then I place 5 indiviually wrapped eggs on a full sheet of bubble wrap and wrap them up together to make a egg log. 3 egg logs work perfect in a medium flat rate box

I then wrap the 3 egg logs together with another sheet of bubble wrap, don’t have a picture of this

I then line my Medium flatrate box with a foil backed bubble wrap, this is actually meant to be used as a radient type of insulation.

I then add a couple of inches of sawdust to the bottom of the box, topped with a sheet of bubble wrap.

I place the egg log on top in the box,

And cover with more sawdust, poking the loose sawdust into the cracks around the egg log.

And cover with another layer of bubble wrap

And fold the foil backed bubble wrap over and tape shut

 

[Robert Blosl]

Very nice job mud stopper. One question do you think the eggs have more ruptured air cells by the eggs laying on thier sides in the box or would you recomend having the eggs big end up and little end down. Some feel they have better hatches with big ends up. I think the sawdust is excellent. I had my best hatches years ago using saw dust shavings as filler between the eggs. Great pictures and will help all of us this year when we ship. bob

 

[Robert Blosl]

Here is a private message I got from a great guy who wants to start up a Poultry Club for Kids. Have any of you out there been a product of a club or 4 H club??

Wanted Barred Rock non Hatchery Standard Breed Birds:

My Response: Are you going to show them or just to enjoy them? bob

His Re: thanks for getting back to me so quick bob. I live in Kentucky and my main objective is to enjoy them myself but I do show at some smaller shows on occasion. i am also a 4H leader and we are trying to get a poultry club up and going in our county. I’d like to see some of the kids in the area have access to some better stock

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Ave you thought of spending some time with youths and help them get started in Poultry and helping them show their birds at county fairs or state fairs?
This is something that we should be thinking about. Only maybe 1% of us will do it but I have never know a kid who was evolved in raising livestock and meeting other kids at fairs go wrong. This is a request where any of our good strains of Standard Barred Plymouth Rocks will be helpful for this fellow. Most of the time when you have a group of kids a leader can order chicks from a hatchery type breeder like Urchs, Joel Gilman or Butches birds. Also what state do you live in? There are about five good strains out there to shoose from.

You can get a small shipments of chicks from a breeder if he has enough breeders birds but they are few and far between. I still think the best way is to put 15 eggs in a incubator and hatch 1- or 11 and ship these chicks to a new person at age five weeks of age overnight express. Would you not be happy to get 11 chicks hatch out of 15 eggs?

Eggs of course is a fear factor because of the way they are treated in shipment. We have many methods posted on another thread how experts do it. I will post this tread below. I talked to a friend in Michigan yesterday giving me the gossip of poultry in the Mid West and found some lost strains of Blue Andulisians and Anaconas in Ohio. The breeder does ship eggs. I got to make a list of these rare breeds maybe some day a guy will make a web site with Heritage Poultry and we can add these names to the list of the birds he list as rare. Wouldn’t that be a nice Christmas present for us old time chicken breed lovers who want standard breed birds. bob

 

[muddstopper]

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Bob, I make a mental note of which way the eggs are turned in the bubble wrap and always try to ship big end up. Something I discovered when wrapping. If the sheets of bubble wrap are cut in half and one end taped to make the pocket, put the little end of the egg in the pocket. Fold the sides together in the middle and then roll up the egg. The egg always seems to be taped on the big end. I place all the big ends the same direction on a full sheet of bubble wrap, little end at the edge and then roll the 5 individual eggs into the log roll. Again, the taped edge seems to always be the big end of the egg. I then place 3 egg logs on another full sheet of bwrap, bigend/taped end up, and roll them up in the full sheet. Again the tape seems to always endup on top. I place in the box with the tape pointed up. I am sure with different size eggs it might not work out the exact same way, but with my buckeye eggs, it seems to work every time. I just got a message saying the last batch I shipped had none broke, 12 developed, and 3 that didnt develope. 6 chicks hatched today, 2 zipped and 4 cant tell yet.

First eggs I shipped I individualy bwrapped and placed in an egg carton and wrapped in more bwrap. I put sawdust in the bottom of the box, placed carton on top of sawdust, then finished filling with sawdust, packing tightley around the carton. Shipped 12, 4 broke in shipping, and I believe it was 3 that hatched. I have never used another egg crate to ship eggs. I sent 15 replacement eggs, wrapped as described above. None broke, and I believe it was 8 hatched. Not sure how many did or didnot develope. I do know that since I started making the egg logs for shipping, I have had none reported broken. I do place live embryo stickers on all sides of the shipping box.

Edited to add, I didnt realize that pic was of such poor quality, but its the only one I have saved on this computer

 

[muddstopper]

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My first livestock animal was a Duroc pig I got thru 4H. I raised her and bred her to produce 12 little pigs. One pig was donated back to 4H for someone else to raise. The rest where sold. We kept and bred the Sow for a couple of years, her estimated weight was around 600lbs when she was converted into breakfast. That Lifetime committment thing that catches up with so many farm animals.