Eggs in the Air

Many of my animal shipments have involved birds, with waterfowl representing a sizable proportion of those.  I love ducks, geese, and swans, but they can be a pain to ship.  The main reason is that many state veterinarians impose special testing requirements for birds, especially for domestic birds - or birds that are close enough to domestic birds, such as wild waterfowl and pheasants - coming into their states.  Those tests can require blood draws, x-rays, or other procedures which can be maddeningly difficult with small birds.

One option which can circumvent this problem - while admittedly, creating a whole new set of problems - is to not ship the birds.  Instead, ship the eggs.

Shipping live, fertilized eggs is a relatively new concept in zoo bird-keeping, and it does have its advantages, mainly in the form of health testing.  Another advantage is that it lets you have an egg laid by a pair of birds that might be genetically valuable as breeders, but awful as parents.  You can instead send the egg somewhere else to be raised by foster parents, either of the same species or a closely related one, so they are raised by other birds rather than humans.

Shipping eggs also has its drawbacks - being more time sensitive and temperature sensitive.  Eggs must be packaged carefully, making sure there is a balance between safety from breaking and ability to breathe.  The exterior packaging must be labeled to prevent rough handling or x-ray exposure.  Temperature is also critical - most shippers include a temp logger in the package to make sure that the eggs are staying at their optimum warmth.

Perhaps most importantly, the time must be just right - ideally between internal pipping (the chick starting to hatch) and external pipping (the egg shell actually breaking).  You want the eggs to hatch shortly after they arrive at their destination.  You do not want the recipient to open the box and find a bunch of chicks flopping around.  For this reason, delays in shipping are bad.  Here is where FedEx overnight is your friend. 

I would prefer ground transport for eggs, if its a short-enough distance and feasible.  It lets you periodically check on and adjust the egg's environment, plus you have eyes on it all the time.

Ideally, your eggs get their safe and sound and they can be plopped into your incubator - or under a willing surrogate mom - to finish the process and hatch out.  Then, they can be welcomed to your facility good as new.