avian flu from purchasing eggs

[MattyBoyNYC]

Hello all. I'm getting ready to purchase some hatching eggs from ebay and I was wondering if there is risk or cause for concern with contracting or spreading bird flu this way.

 

[AinaWGSD]

I'm not entirely sure how likely it would be, but I imagine the risk is minimal if you wash your hands before and after handling the eggs (which you should be doing anyway)

Eta: if you're particularly concerned, here is an article about using odoban to sterilize hatching eggs

 

[Apis mellifera]

I would think the birds would be dead or almost dead before the shipper had time to collect eggs and ship them.

"Chickens infected with highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) can show symptoms and die within 24 to 48 hours after the onset of the disease. In some cases, death can occur so rapidly that no prior symptoms are observed."

 

[Traffie Chickens]

Hello all. I'm getting ready to purchase some hatching eggs from ebay and I was wondering if there is risk or cause for concern with contracting or spreading bird flu this way.

I was just talking about this last night! I also bought eBay eggs and they are currently on day 11. I was wondering if there was a possibility that the chicks that hatch from them could spread things to my older hens.

 

[FunClucks]

There are diseases that are communicable from hens to their eggs, but it all depends on the disease vector, aka how the disease is transmitted. If you sanitize the eggs with Odoban, and sanitize your hands and equipment prior to loading eggs in the incubator, you won't allow transmittal of anything on the outside of the eggs. (aka mites, diseases spread by dander such as Mereks, etc.) If you look in the hatching articles on this site or the Merck Veterinary Manual, you can come up with a list of diseases transmitted from hens to their eggs, and those are the ones I'd be worried about.

But really, if you look at commercial hatchery certifications, even the best tested of them don't test for everything. They change over their breeding stock every two years, which is often before symptoms of some of the diseases become evident. I don't know that there's a way to eliminate all risk while still allowing them some semblance of a normal chicken life.

Selecting trustworthy breeders, having as much environmental security measures in place as possible, and then hoping for the best is really the best plan I have when it comes for things like this.

 

[MattyBoyNYC]

thanks all for your input!