Re: washing eggs (was hatching round eggs)



"Andrea Fease" <afease@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:e54loh$l8s$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Gosh, I didn't mean to make such a scene :-) .

No scene - just lively discussion - its a wonderful thing

Yes, the rain here has been
torrential, and we are only now getting out of the muck. I put down hay
yesterday and it almost survived the day :-) . Normally the ground is
soft and the chickens can dig up worms and aerate their ground, but over
the past couple of weeks that's been impossible and they have been locked
up in the barn. Only now are they starting to be able to get out and
about.

horrid to have to deal with


We've tried adding gravel over the years, and it's just sunk into the
ground, as have hay, shavings, etc. We will try some chips and see if
that will work. Eventually one would think the ground would stop
absorbing stuff when it gets rainy, but that doesn't seem to happen :-) .

Woah ! - before you lay anything you need to create some drainage - dig out
trenches and fill with coarse gravel or with drainage pipe. That will be the
most worthwhile time and effort you will ever spend
THEN - lay down ground cover membrane. This has to be the permeable
landscaping kind. This will prevent whatever you lay on top mixing with the
soil below
If you miss out the preparatory steps you will simply have the same result
and the equally wasted time, energy and money
This way you will have a much improved surface for next winter and spring
If you can create a canopy of any description for as far as practical from
the house outwards you will gain even more benefit -- the girls will be more
sheltered and drier and so will your bedding so saving you mucking out time,
bedding costs, egg cleaning time, and potential diseases


As for washing eggs, it seems to be an acceptable practice here. I can't
find where I read about it,whether it was in a book or one of our
cooperative extension bulletins, but here is one from another state that
says that washing in warm water is ok:

http://www.ext.vt.edu/pubs/poultry/factsheets/9.html

If it isn't, I can stop doing it, I certainly not glued to the idea :-) .

I am mildly surprised but maybe US food safety standards are different


Wouldn't brushing or wiping take the coat off too?

It does not seem to - you can still see the bloom


For poultry I have 75 chickens and 12 ducks. Also 2 roosters, one of
which is my favorite. Rocky (the Plymouth Rock rooster) has had a hard
life - lived through a couple of bouts of respiratory infections and now
has only one eye compliments of another rooster that is no longer with us.
He is calm and even tempered, what a sweetheart, and seems to get around
ok. His other eye has a little bit of cataract, as do the two elderly
ducks he's housed with (they are all about 12 years old), with his own
private yard. He loves his duck buddies and they don't make too much of a
mess being elderly. He still crows and tries to be a rooster, if the hen
is cooperative he does ok, if she isn't, well it's easy to avoid a
sight-challenged rooster!

bless


I appreciate all the advice here and am always welcome to ideas to make my
chickens' and ducks' lives better!

- Andrea

I hope your weather clears up soon into a great summer

--

regards
Jill Bowis

Pure bred utility chickens and ducks
Housing; Equipment, Books, Videos, Gifts
Herbaceous; Herb and Alpine nursery
Working Holidays in Scotland
http://www.kintaline.co.uk





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