Why no washing/disinfecting eggs?

[lightfoot]

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I wish to thank you for all the research you've done and openly sharing with us here. you have stopped me from making some serious mistakes with my chicks. I see some negativity in comments made by others, ignore them and continue sharing your knowledge. I have read some of your references and have some questions I need to ask you later. is PM ok?
bob

My "negativity" only comes because she's not sharing her own experiences....only studies that can be slanted to whichever direction the people running the study want them to turn out. I'd rather hear people's personal experiences with how they incubate and hatch any day of the week rather than links to studies that in some cases are several years old. I've been hatching the way I do for many years now and unless they are shipped eggs I have very good hatch rates....looks like that is more relevent than a study someone did with commercial eggs on a very large scale.

To gain knowledge is to take all points of information and determine their validity and usefulness.

 

[BlacksheepCardigans]

The reason I haven't shared my experience (which is: groups that I incubate that include dirty eggs have a much higher death rate in the whole hatch than when I have a group where none of the eggs are dirty) is precisely because the plural of anecdote is not fact. It's kind of like a ton of people saying "I never wore a seatbelt and I'm fine!" Well, yes, obviously you have survived long enough to write that, so anecdotally not wearing a seatbelt is safe. But when you look across the entire spectrum of people driving, not wearing a seatbelt substantially increases your risk of death. Or, another example, I have four daughters and no sons. My anecdotal evidence is that it's much more likely to have girls than boys when you're pregnant. But nobody should trust me if I say that. The reason there's such a thing as studies, and why they're more reliable than anecdotes, is that you have to look at a large group where nothing else could possibly be the issue before you can say something that approaches truth.

I know there's that line - anybody can find studies to prove anything - but it's actually not true. A single study is interesting but not conclusive. A peer-reviewed published study is more interesting but still not actionable. A huge number of studies, showing that the phenomenon is reliable and can be replicated, is where the rubber hits the road.

Using an example from humans, let's say that a company invents a compound that they believe will work as an antidepressant. That company does the initial studies, finds that the compound is more effective than a placebo, and submits those studies to the FDA. At that point a few MDs are probably aware of the new compound but nobody is going to prescribe it yet, because at that point it actually is in the "I am not sure this study is reliable; it may be slanted" stage. They all wait for peer-reviewed published studies from individuals who don't work for the companies. Those come, and still there's going to be very slow/light adoption of the new drug. Then more studies start to pile up, and after maybe ten or twenty, and at least one is a large observational study by individuals who have no connection to the original company, your doctor might say "There's a new drug on the market that looks promising for your type of depression; I'd like you to think about switching." And then, usually a few years after the drug has reached wide adoption, researchers at the NIH or a similar large group will do a massive retrospective study of thousands of people, looking for evidence that the drug really has worked. That massive study is considered the most reliable, and it defines "best practices" for the medical community vis a vis that drug or class of drugs for a few years until they have enough new compounds on the market that they need to do another massive retrospective study.

Ag researchers have been saying that you need to disinfect eggs since 1908. We're past the initial part, past the adoption part, waaaaaaay past the observational and even retrospective parts. Never setting dirty eggs, and disinfecting clean ones, has been considered a best practice for decades. We're LONG past the time when a study would benefit anybody economically; nobody is testing a brand-name disinfectant, and skipping the disinfectant entirely would be cheaper for the big hatchery. I really can't see where any piece of disinfecting has anybody tempted toward wrongdoing and therefore trying to slant studies.

Will you get dirty eggs that hatch - absolutely. Will you get hatch after hatch after hatch at decent rates if you never wash an egg - yes. The question is whether you are OPTIMIZING your hatching rates, getting as high as you can possibly get. The question is whether the advice to never wash is good advice, neutral advice, or bad advice.

Those can't be answered by me and my Brinseas. All I could ever give are anecdotes. Best practices need to be based on reliable and experimentally controlled evidence over years.

Veering slightly away from disinfection, on this board we have anecdotal evidence that hatching eggs on their ends (the "hatching in egg cartons" method) may partially compensate for less than ideal humidity during incubation. I think that's fascinating and it makes very good sense to me, and my current eggs, which are a couple days away from lockdown, are going to hatch upright. But it's still in the "that makes sense" stage; if I have a good result it's still just anecdotal. If I came across fifty studies that all showed that hatchability was much lower in upright eggs, then I have to conclude that my experience with ten eggs is not as reliable as their experience with thirty thousand eggs.

We rely on studies in every other aspect of the way we raise chickens. Studies determine the ingredients and protein content in feed, but we're happy to tell someone that their protein is too low or their calcium content isn't high enough. Studies determine which cross produces the fastest-growing bird, which is why Cornish X are being raised in huge quantities. Studies tell us that dry litter is healthier than wet litter, that leghorns are bad feather-pickers, that low protein leads to cannibalism. All of these we're happy to use to give advice. So why is washing eggs all of a sudden the result of "one-sided studies"?

 

[Muggsmagee]

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My "negativity" only comes because she's not sharing her own experiences....only studies that can be slanted to whichever direction the people running the study want them to turn out. I'd rather hear people's personal experiences with how they incubate and hatch any day of the week rather than links to studies that in some cases are several years old. I've been hatching the way I do for many years now and unless they are shipped eggs I have very good hatch rates....looks like that is more relevent than a study someone did with commercial eggs on a very large scale.

To gain knowledge is to take all points of information and determine their validity and usefulness.

Agreed. However, one sided "slanted" points and studies lead me to think they are biased and inconclusive. A study done by the USDA for commercial hatcheries is to protect their monies, prevent wide spread disease that can be passed from egg to bird to flock to nationwide catastrophe. Comparing a large scale hatchery (that can hatch 100,000 chicks a day) to mom and pop home hatchers is not an apples to apples comparitive. It just isn't. Do I think the hatcheries should stop disinfecting hatching eggs...currently, no. Do I think I should be required to wash my clean eggs straight from the nesting box, no.

This is what I'm trying to convey. The hatchery studies do not pertain in their entirety to us. Utilize the info you find to suit yourself. That's okay. If you find it works for you...go for it. But the long range affects have not been taken into account. (My question is why chickens have become more susceptible to disease in the last century? Is it linked to the disinfecting, antibiotics injections, etc, etc?)

BlacksheepCardigans, I can agree with you completely that it would take 100's and 100's of eggs to give a clearer study. It sure can be tested in small quantities...just not conclusively. That is what makes this debate so interesting. The variables that play into this.

Is this arguing?

I sure don't have that intention...just friendly debating.

Edited to fix parentheses...it bothered me.

 

[Katy]

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I don't care if someone chooses to disinfect their eggs or not....it's their choice.

If as you stated in a previous post that the eggs draw in contaminates in those few seconds before the bloom dries after they're laid, what is the point of disinfecting the outside of the egg?

I have good hatches as a rule with my eggs. I don't think I'm going to change at this late date. The only thing I've changed in recent years is I now hatch them in egg cartons rather than laying on the wire.

 

[aShMaNv]

Well when the hen lays a egg she coats the egg with a protective bloom coating. Although the outside of the egg may be dirty, the inside is protected by the bloom. If the egg is washed, the bloom will be washed away allowing bacteria to enter the pores of the egg. Thus, you would be doing more damage by trying to wash a egg off than by leaving it alone. In fact most of my customers who buy eggs from me DONT want me to clean the eggs. They would rather have them dirty and wash them just before using them. However i do not know how it would affect hatch rate, as i have not studied it. I would think the same concept would apply.

 

[BlacksheepCardigans]

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Two points: To keep that egg from contaminating other eggs that are near it or touching it, and to try to get the bacteria level on the shell low enough that the embryo can still survive even if it's already got some inside. Bacteria-contaminated chicks can hatch, if the numbers are low enough. But they can spread what is on their shells to the other eggs. That's why disinfecting helps hatchability; it may or may not save the embryo that was already contaminated but it can save its neighbors.

 

[Katy]

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Two points: To keep that egg from contaminating other eggs that are near it or touching it, and to try to get the bacteria level on the shell low enough that the embryo can still survive even if it's already got some inside. Bacteria-contaminated chicks can hatch, if the numbers are low enough. But they can spread what is on their shells to the other eggs. That's why disinfecting helps hatchability; it may or may not save the embryo that was already contaminated but it can save its neighbors.

I'm seriously not trying to be argumentative, but some of your points just make no sense to me.

Unless you have hens that each lay in their individual nests so that their eggs have no access to each other or gather them one at a time those eggs are going to have more than likely been touching quite a bit already and had the opportunity to pass whatever bacteria is on them to each other before they ever reach an incubator.

Sorry but maybe I'll put more stock in what you say when you come back in several years after you've hatched out hundreds of chicks and give us your own findings on how your hatches turned out.

 

[theredroosta]

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Umm, you should some of the many studies blacksheep has provided. Proves the opposite.

 

[theredroosta]

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Two points: To keep that egg from contaminating other eggs that are near it or touching it, and to try to get the bacteria level on the shell low enough that the embryo can still survive even if it's already got some inside. Bacteria-contaminated chicks can hatch, if the numbers are low enough. But they can spread what is on their shells to the other eggs. That's why disinfecting helps hatchability; it may or may not save the embryo that was already contaminated but it can save its neighbors.

I'm seriously not trying to be argumentative, but some of your points just make no sense to me.

Unless you have hens that each lay in their individual nests so that their eggs have no access to each other or gather them one at a time those eggs are going to have more than likely been touching quite a bit already and had the opportunity to pass whatever bacteria is on them to each other before they ever reach an incubator.

Sorry but maybe I'll put more stock in what you say when you come back in several years after you've hatched out hundreds of chicks and give us your own findings on how your hatches turned out.

I don't understand what more you can argue, even if what you say is true the results don't lie! Cleaning/disinfecting eggs clearly has a better effect on the hatch rate than not. That is just the evidence, I don't understand how people can be so challenging when they have so little proof and a mountain of proof from the opposing is given to you! The eggs may be infected with bacteria and what not, but the question here is if washing/disinfecting eggs increases the hatch rate and it clearly and obviously does. You can't be so stubborn, and you can't always be right.

 

[Tony]

One of my posts from a couple years ago.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=47241