Another Lesson on Eggs

Lets talk eggs again.  Eggs are a marvelous wonder in packaging,  not to mention the inner workings of the egg.  Some people think when they see that white squiggly thing in their eggs that it is fertilized.  This is wrong.  That white squiggly thing is actually called the chalaza and acts as a bungie cord to help stabilize the yolk so it does not bang around and break apart.  Here is a picture of the all the sections of an egg.  I bet you did not know they all existed.

There is a larger air pocket at the rounder end of the egg.  If a peep were to be developing its head is always at this end.  This is so that as the peep develops and gets bigger it can breath that air stored in that end of the egg.  Eggs are complicated but at the same time wonderfully simple environments.  As you can see from the diagram above there are two distinct sections of the egg white: the thick albumin, and the thin albumin.  This is very visible when you fry an egg.  Part of the white in runnier and spreads out while closer to the yolk the white is thicker and stays in place without running all over the pan.

Some may see that whitish dot on the yolk and think it is fertilized.  This is also wrong.  All eggs have that dot.  As you can see from the top picture that is called the Blastodisc.  The purpose of the blastodisc is to allow fertilization if male sperm is introduced to it.  If an egg is fertilized there will be a faint but distinct donut ring around the blastodisc as is seen in the picture below.  This will not alter the taste or texture of the egg.

If you keep the fertilized egg warm and rotate them, they will develop into embryos and hopefully hatch in healthy peeps.  I do not hatch my own eggs.  I prefer to buy day old peeps.  I do have a rooster but he is not the more charismatic guy so he does not hit home runs with the hens consistently.  I would end up wasting a lot of eggs and time trying to incubate eggs from this group.

So today's lesson we learned that the white squiggly thing is not a fertilized egg it is a bungie cord for the yolk,  That little plain white dot on the yolk is not fertilized it is the blastodisc, and my rooster needs dating lessons to improve his luck with the ladies.

Teenage Little Girl Chickens

Today was a pretty nice day so we let the chickens free range around the yard.  We try to let them free range as much as possible.  This serves 2 purposes.  One, they get to run around and explore and that makes for happy birds, and two, they eat every bug in the yard, and that makes for happy owners!  Let me introduce you to Twiddle Dee and Twiddle Dumb.  These 2 girls go everywhere together.  They are truly BFFs.  Where one is the other is close behind.  They also enable each other and are the most mischievous chickens I own.

Today for instance, as soon as the run door was opened they took off running for the hills!  ok, not the hills as we live at the top of the mountains...but they took off running for the back yard.  Wing in wing they waddled as fast as their little chicken feet could carry them.  This upset Chip the rooster very much.  He is very protective of his girls and he is always looking out for them.  Whoever came up with the term 'mother hen' should have met Chip...overprotective father hen!  Dee and Dumb just giggled and rounded the house out of Chip's sight.  The spotted the duck box and Dee said to Dumb, "Lets hide in there!"  The both ducked into the duck box and played around in the shavings that were in there, giggling and carrying on like two young teenagers.  Chip finally rounded the corner of the house and started to panic....where did his girls go?~!  He let out crow after crow, and the girls just giggled as they hid in the box.  Dumb said to Dee, "SHHHH  he will hear you!  Be quiet!"

Finally Chip gave out another crow in desperation, and gave up and went back to the front yard to check on the rest of his flock.  At that time Dee and Dumb tumbled out of the duck box laughing their beaks off!  "HAHA  he did not find us!!"  Silly birds.  Dee and Dumb like to hang out in the back yard around the central air unit and under the back deck.

When you go near them to try to corral them back to the front yard they will duck under the deck and hang out in the middle where you can't reach them.  "Neener Neener Neener!  You can't get us!!"  Goofy birds.  I fear that a hawk will show them just how touchable they really are!  I hope not and try to keep an eye on them a best I can - but they roam around and dig up the rocks at their will.

Things should get real interesting around here in a week or so.  We ordered 26 new peeps to add to the flock.  Anyone need any eggs??!!