The eggs arrive after a long journey. Being ready to open the boxes and carry out the Re-incubation work as soon as possible is key to the success of our operation.
When the egg boxes arrive in the hatchery, boxes should be disinfected and treated with the utmost care, to avoid excessive handling of the product.
Customers should open egg boxes, preferably following the instructions below:
1. Remove tape, lid, and polystyrene.
2. Open the plastic bag and remove the ice.
3. Carefully cut the sides of the box, without cutting the trays.
4. Slide trays from box, supporting from bottom. Remove tape from trays and separate trays.
At this stage of the process you should observe and record the following:
These observations should be recorded and kept regardless of whether the shipment is in good condition or not. The information is invaluable in monitoring shipping success rates and any variation in those rates over time.
As determined by Troutlodge’s latest study you do not need to invest much time in temperature acclimatization but should rather focus on the hydration of the eggs on arrival at the hatchery. This is due to poor acclimatization practices that can suffocate eggs. This malpractice consists of placing the eggs for several hours in buckets of water without adequate water replacement. Eggs need a lot of oxygen after their long journey. However, if your hatchery has well-trained staff, the right facilities, sufficient water flow and backup oxygen, you may be able to safely acclimatize while hydrating the eggs. This ideal acclimatization should be performed by gradually increasing the temperature of the eggs to the temperature of the hatchery water (2C/hour). At the end of this, the eggs will also be completely rehydrated.
Best hatch rates are achieved by rehydrating, disinfecting if necessary and placing eggs directly into incubation as quickly as possible upon arrival.
To reduce the risks of introducing disease, re-hydrated eggs should be disinfected with any iodine-based aquaculture product for a period of 10 minutes at 100 ppm
It is important to know the approximate number of eggs that are placed in each productive unit. To do this, use the methods for estimating the number of eggs that were described in this miniguide. Eggs should be kept away from direct light until the end of hatching. The monitoring of water quality parameters is essential at this stage, as it will determine the development and health of the new fingerlings. Eggs during re-incubation should not be subjected to any type of stress, except the minimum caused by cleaning procedures and some other treatment to prevent some type of fungus.
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