Egg quality and age of laying hens: implications for product safety
J. R. Roberts A C , Kapil Chousalkar B and
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A Animal Science, School of Environmental and Rural Science, University of New England, Armidale, NSW 2351, Australia.
B School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, Roseworthy Campus, University of Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia.
C Corresponding author. Email: jrobert2@une.edu.au
Animal Production Science 53(12) 1291-1297 https://doi.org/10.1071/AN12345
Submitted: 4 October 2012 Accepted: 5 May 2013 Published: 6 June 2013
Journal Compilation © CSIRO Publishing 2013 Open Access CC BY-NC-ND
Abstract
Eggs were collected from commercial caged layer flocks in early, mid, late and very late lay. Eggs were candled and scored for translucency. Cuticle cover was estimated using MST Cuticle Stain and a Konica Minolta hand-held spectrophotometer. Traditional measures of egg quality were determined using specialised equipment. Shell ultrastructural features were scored following plasma ashing of shell samples and viewing under a benchtop scanning electron microscope. Translucency score was significantly higher in late lay than for all other age groups. Shell quality declined with increasing flock age. However, the extent of cuticle cover on the egg shell was not significantly different among flock age groups. The incidence of shell ultrastructural features associated with good quality shells was lower for older flocks and incidence of ultrastructural features associated with poorer quality shells was higher for older flocks. Translucency score had a low correlation with the ultrastructural features of the mammillary layer.
Additional keywords: cuticle, food safety, shell quality, translucency.
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