Quality and shell integrity of Japanese quail eggs: an assessment during storage and at market

Abstract

Rearing of Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) has created an emerging interest in recent years among the small-scale poultry farmers in Sri Lanka, and is becoming a commercial venture in the alternative poultry industry. Thus, assessment was done on quality variation of Japanese quail eggs during the storage with different methods of packaging at room temperature. In the first experiment, a total of 120 eggs from the same flock were stored using three methods, i.e. with paper boxes filled with paddy husks, plastic egg cartons and without package at the room temperature. The egg quality during storage was assessed using egg weight, shell thickness, shape index, yolk colour, yolk index, Haugh unit and egg weight loss at weekly intervals in a complete randomize design with three replicates. In the second experiment, one hundred Japanese quail eggs collected from five market outlets were used to evaluate the shell integrity. The results were analyzed using Analysis of Variance and descriptive statistics in the two experiments. The results revealed that the egg weight, yolk colour, yolk index and Haugh unit were significantly decreased (P<0.05) with the storage period except shell thickness and shape index. The weight loss was increased significantly (P<0.05) during the storage irrespective of the method of packaging. However, packaging significantly reduced (P<0.05) the weight loss where plastic cartons recorded the eggs with the lowest weight loss. Changes of Haugh units and yolk index plateaued towards the end of storage irrespective of the method of storage among which no significant differences were observed (P>0.05). There was a significant (P<0.05) deterioration of yolk colour after two weeks of storage in all storage methods. Plastic carton preserved high yolk colour up to week-1, and showed no difference among the methods of storage towards the end of three weeks of storage. The results of shell integrity assessment revealed that only 66% of eggs were with total integrity and the rest were with failures during the market chain. The study concludes that quail eggs stored in paper boxes or plastic cartons could preserve the quality parameters, i.e. minimum quality losses, at room temperature compared to those stored without package. Commercial operations need to pay attention to improve the shell integrity of quail eggs in market chain.