All about the Egg

Ever since we have had chickens I have been consistently amazed at all the uniqueness of animal husbandry.  We have chosen not to have a rooster, mainly due to my prior experiences with my mother's rooster (if a person wanted to escape the coop intact, you took a pitchfork to defend yourself from the rooster's fierce flogging). 

Honestly, I haven't found that we are lacking anything by having left the rooster to others.  I do find that those who do not have chickens shy away from farm fresh eggs because they have heard of the horror stories of finding a fertilized egg or partial chick in the egg. 

 For the record (as many of my non-farm friends did not know) if you don't have a rooster, there is zero chance of having anything besides an egg in your egg...i.e. no rooster, no fertilization.  Sounds simple enough but many do not know this tidbit.

Did you know that chickens need a roosting spot and if you don't keep them in a coop they will roost in almost anything that is off the ground overnight including low tree branches (we have found a stray girl roosting on top of the woodpile, the hay mound, the seat of a bike, etc when they don't get put up for the night).  Here is a snapshot of my girls roosting and also of the laying boxes we use, courtesy of my parents who shared with us when we moved to our farm.

One of the funniest things I have seen is when we had Turkeys and the Turkeys were so big that they would push the hens off the roosting slats.

What else is so interesting about the egg layer?  They will eat almost anything and though the "free range- all natural" egg cartons in the stores would have you believe differently by their "All Vegetarian Fed" logos, Chickens are carnivores...just wait till you ever see a mouse run through the coop...the chase is on!  I snapped the photo below as the girls were chasing stray bits of dog food I had dropped, like I said, they will eat almost anything!

Then there are the egg oddities...my kids love this part.  Some eggs are brown, some white, some blue, green and even shades of violet and pink.  We currently have all brown layers with the exception of one Easter Egger who lays green eggs.  When a chicken is young and first begins laying it is usually when they will lay doubles.  This happens as the ovulatory cycle in the young hen has not fully developed so often times with young layers, double yolks can be quite common.  As the hen gets older this becomes less likely. 

 Here is a snapshot of one of the cool doubles we got a week or so ago.  This one was so large that when we cracked it there were literally 2 full sized eggs inside (usually a double has smaller yolks and whites, kinda like human baby twin sets are oft times smaller than a single birth).

Then there was the strangest thing I have seen yet...well except for maybe the "Naked Eggs" which is where the egg is laid with a membrane only holding it all together and no shell...those are cool as it is like a water balloon...unfortunately I don't have a snapshot of one of those.  My oldest son brought in this little bitty baby egg and was so excited to see its diminutive form cracked in the pan...His sister asked for it to be posed for some photos first...

So, when we cracked it?  There was no yolk.  Strange.  My 3 y/o ate it as he prefers the whites of the egg anyway.  All in day of animal husbandry...see all the unique things that go on?