EMBRYONIC MORTALITY AND BROILER CHICK QUALITY (Gallus gallus) FROM GLASS-SHELLED EGGS

Abstract

The glass-shelled egg has various points on the surface with light gray coloration, which becomes more visible with the passage of egg storage period. The objective of this work was to evaluate the stage of embryonic mortality, egg weight during the incubation period, hatch window, and quality of chicks at hatch from glass-shelled egg. The research was divided into two parts. In the first part, 80 eggs from 45 weeks old hens were incubated, being half normal eggs and half glass-shelled eggs, while in the second part, 80 eggs from 70 weeks old hens from the same flock as the previous one were incubated. Again, half were normal shelled and half were glass-shelled eggs. No differences were observed for embryonic mortality, egg weight, hatch quality (hatch weight, uniformity, and navel quality), and hatch window between normal and glass-shelled eggs from hens of 45 and 70 weeks of age. However, there was higher contamination in glass-shelled egg from 70-week-old breeder hens. The results show that the presence of glass-shelled egg does not seem to interfere with the quality of the chick at hatch in the breed, ages, and studied conditions, but causes higher contamination in glass-shelled egg from 70-week-old breeder hens.
Keywords: Hatch Window; Chick quality; Embryonic development.