Steff
Joined: 08 Aug 2005
Posts: 6
Location: Wales
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 Posted: Fri Oct 14, 2005 12:56 pm Post subject: Fish smelling eggs!!! |
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Hi,
I wonder if anyone could answer this bizarre problem!!!
When we crack some of the eggs open, there's a nasty fish smell. We were advised that it would be fish meal in the feed. But we have changed the feed that doesn't contain fish meal & they're still smelling!!
Any suggestions?
Thank you. |
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nigel
Moderator
Joined: 13 Apr 2005
Posts: 2473
Location: Skåne, Sweden
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| Posted: Fri Oct 14, 2005 8:34 pm Post subject: |
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I knew I had read something on this before. It's a from Krys Brennand, a poultry breeder and authority on poultry genetics from Lluest in Wales.
| Quote: | | These "fishy" eggs are not as a result of feeding,but are caused by a malfunction of the hen." This aroused my interest so I looked in 'Poultry Breeding & Genetics' On page 792 there's a section on this. Apparently it's caused by the presence of an autosomal semidominant gene with variable expression (I don't know what the difference between semidominant & incompletely dominant is). Anyway, as you'd deduced the smell is caused by trimethylamine (TMA). The TMA in normal hens is oxidised to triethylamine oxide. If there is a deficiency of TMA oxidase, the hen can't metabolise all of the TMA, which mostly comes from her diet. So the TMA is excreted in the egg giving a tainted egg. Apparently the presence of rapeseed in the diet has been shown to make affected birds produce tainted eggs, even though there is not, it seems, much TMA in rapeseed meal. Apparently this condition is highly heritable in both males & females. |
The thread is here if you want to read more.
Hope this may be of some help |
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