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Tuesday, March 16, 2021

The Complete Beginner’s Guide To Egg Candling

Last week I posted a gif showing egg candling and got several inquiries about it - what was happening, why it was done, and how. This will explain it better than I can.

Egg candling is a neat, cheap, and easy way to discover what is happening inside the egg, but how do you do it? Here you will find the complete guide on what candling is and the when and how to perform it. I will also explain away some of the mystery behind candling and to help you get proficient at this skill which is extremely useful when you are incubating and hatching.

Do you have to candle an egg? No, really you don’t, but if you can, it takes some of the guesswork out of hatching and can help you to improve the chances of subsequent hatches.
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6 comments:

  1. JeremyRMarch 16, 2021 at 8:08 AM

    I have a mixed bunch of eggs in the incubator. I candled them last night. My Americana eggs don't candle well, the white and brown eggs, no problems, but those green ones might as well be solid steel.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Country BoyMarch 16, 2021 at 8:27 AM

    I grew up on an egg farm back in the '60s (think 9,000 chickens next door in a hot Texas summer). The eggs were for sale to stores, restaurants, and individuals. Every egg was candled to look for cracks, blood (if a chicken is suddenly frightened there will be blood in the egg about three days later), and other problems. You can also tell how old an egg is by candling it. There will be spots inside the shell after the first day. The larger the spots, the older the egg. These form whether or not the egg was stored in a cooler. I often check eggs at the store to see how old they are before I buy them. Eggs with the same expiration date will vary from one day old, to a week old.

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  3. Kapt KaosMarch 16, 2021 at 8:49 AM

    Thanks for the info, Kenny.

    ReplyDelete
  4. SkipperdaddyMarch 16, 2021 at 10:01 AM

    I usually candle mine after the first week. If they are clear I know to take them out.

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousMarch 16, 2021 at 11:15 AM

    Friends of my parents owned a chicken farm used to raise eggs for sale. They had a semiautomatic candling machine. It required two people to operate. One to load the eggs onto the conveyor, the other to actually look at the eggs. The good eggs proceeded on to the grader, which graded eggs automatically. The ones that candled with blood spots were fed to the pigs. Mildly cracked ones were food for the family, unless the shell was smashed.

    Nemo

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SkipperdaddyMarch 16, 2021 at 12:13 PM

      I think ken had one of those in the gif seg the other day.

      Delete

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