Amusing myself - chicken style

Peledreamsofrain

So, our area has recently gotten an influx of organic grocery store chains, and I've noticed a strange trend in the eggs these places offer.  They're fertile.  I have no idea if fertile eggs are supposed to have magic health enzymes or something, but I DO know that refrigeration does not lower fertility of eggs.

SO, the last time I was at the new local Whole Foods store, I picked up a pack of fertile eggs (they're labled that way), and took them home, then popped them into my incubator.

I have 10 out of 11 eggs developing!  Very excited now!  It'll only be 12 more days now till hatch.  I can't wait to see what kind of chickens Whole Foods uses for their commercial eggs!

Sharpschruter22

That's cool. Do you already have chickens?

dtbluv

Wait, are they selling these as eating eggs, or make-a-chicken eggs?

Have you eaten the fertilized eggs?  Are there any blood-spots or anything?

This is really freaking me out.

But yay for baby chicks!

Peledreamsofrain

Yes I already have hens, and I love love love love them!  They're so entertaining, and having fresh eggs is such a blessing! 

The eggs that I bought from the store are supposed to be eating eggs, but I took advantage of  how eggs work (refrigeration doesn't ruin their hatchability, only age does), and am hatching them.  I'm probably breaking some strange law somewhere, but I don't care :P.

Blood spots are actually normal, even in unfertilized eggs.  It's just a small blood vessel rupture in the reproductive tract during the formation of the egg.  A fertilized egg will actually have a small white bullseye mark on the yolk, where the sperm penetrated and left the beginnings of a blastoderm.

Hah, I'm a nerd :P

Vivi+Pete

I just can't stop thinking about this. I'm making Christmas cookies and picturing a little tiny chicklet in my cookie dough. Thanks.

cwaggoner07

I can't get over how strange this is. I'm sure it's fine, and I believe you that it's fine, but it's just so strange...

Peledreamsofrain

Lol sorry, didn't mean to gross people out. If it helps, eggs don't 'activate' and start growing an embryo until incubated at 99 degrees or so. So even if you accidentally got one, it's the same as an unfertile egg.. No chicklets. Honestly though, it's only our culture of being so divorced from our food that has trained us to mentally seperate eggs from what they really are. I have had people refuse to eat my eggs because they've seen the hens they came from. That's it, just saw the chicken and it became too real.

krizzo17

I once got a "twins" egg (two yolks). It was unfertilized, but pretty much every time I've cracked an egg since then I've secretly been hoping for it to happen again.

Peledreamsofrain

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_chit-chat_amusing-myself-chicken-style?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:14Discussion:07b7c00f-c8a2-404b-85f8-8fa4f2bcb143Post:a36f57f6-f41a-4930-baa6-826a5b8b8032">Re: Amusing myself - chicken style</a>:
[QUOTE]I once got a "twins" egg (two yolks). It was unfertilized, but pretty much every time I've cracked an egg since then I've secretly been hoping for it to happen again.
Posted by krizzo17[/QUOTE]

You can actually tip odds in your favor on that!  I love double-yolk eggs, and back when I used to buy eggs from the supermarket, I paid attention to how eggs looked when I got them.  Here's what I found:

Buy only Jumbo sized eggs.  Two yolks take a lot of room, so the chicken's body will compensate by creating a larger shell.   If you are really enterprising, you can take it further by looking for eggs that have slightly irregular shapes to the shell.  I used to be able to create custom 12 packs of mostly double-yolked eggs that way.  Though I did get strange looks at the store while I assembled them <img src="http://cdn.cl9.vanillaforums.com/downloaded/ver1.0/content/scripts/tinymce/plugins/emotions/images/smiley-tongue-out.gif" border="0" alt="Tongue out" title="Tongue out" />

misshart00

My dad has hens and gave me a fertilized egg once. He helpede incubate it. Poor thing died just a few days before it was supposed to hatch.

Peledreamsofrain

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_chit-chat_amusing-myself-chicken-style?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:14Discussion:07b7c00f-c8a2-404b-85f8-8fa4f2bcb143Post:1b289853-d73c-4b66-a25a-4e2600a9eefd">Re: Amusing myself - chicken style</a>:
[QUOTE]This thread reminds me of when we incubated chickens in grade school.  We had a funeral for all the chicks that didn't hatch and our teacher opened them all so we could see how far into their development they got.  Some of my classmates and I played taps as we buried them.  That was sad.
Posted by LingerLonger1[/QUOTE]

Yeah, it is sad when they don't make it.  In fact, I used to have a cheap styrofoam incubator, and it was so finicky and kicked temperatures around so badly that it killed an entire hatch recently about a day before they were due. 

It made me so sad that my sweet husband went out and got me a high-end incubator as an early Xmas present.  I'm using it right now for the grocery store eggs, and can't believe how much better it is than my old one! 

Mwahaha little does he know what he's unleashed!

CALEO

Very cool!

LincolnElizabethH

It's interesting that your local store would advertise, and sell, fertilized eggs. But I think it's cool that you are hatching them!

Peledreamsofrain

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_chit-chat_amusing-myself-chicken-style?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:14Discussion:07b7c00f-c8a2-404b-85f8-8fa4f2bcb143Post:fa0f4da0-ab95-4205-8f00-1adfbe414a92">Re: Amusing myself - chicken style</a>:
[QUOTE]It's interesting that your local store would advertise, and sell, fertilized eggs. But I think it's cool that you are hatching them!
Posted by jennifervola[/QUOTE]

Yeah I thought it was weird too.  I'm not part of the health or organic community, so I'm not sure if they think it has unusual enzymes, protiens, or something else.   It could be as simple as proving that the hens free-range naturally with roosters around.  Dunno.

rusngl2

Just because I have WAY too much time on my hands today:

"There has been much argument about the health benefits of fertilized eggs with some claiming that they are nutritionally superior to unfertilized ones. There may be some health benefits to eating very fresh eggs, fertilized or not, though these may be extremely minimal. Eggs do start to lose protein the longer they sit, though refrigeration helps to arrest protein loss. Most scientific nutritional organizations claim there is little to no difference in nutritional benefits between fertilized and non-fertilized eggs."

from http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-fertilized-eggs.htm

Peledreamsofrain

That's awesome rusngl2!  Thanks for posting that!  I figured people thought there was nutritional value to it.  I'm not personally convinced. 

However, I DO know that I can't stand to eat grocery store eggs anymore.  Bleh, all runny and broken down from age.  Pale too.  Gimme bright orange fresh and firm yolks from my girls anyday .  They are way superior for baking too!

rusngl2

My aunt used to raise chickens when I was little, I have vivid memories of her going out every morning and spreading corn or something around and the chickens would come running.  

One of the more traumatic memories though was the day she decided she wanted chicken for dinner. She went out tossing corn around, the chickens came 'arunning. She grabbed one and well, it didn't end well for the chicken... I couldnt eat it....

allychase

This is so cool. I'm also jealous of the organic markets in your area.. I live in a very populated area and there isn't a single organic grocery store anywhere near by.

Peledreamsofrain

I got a picture of the egg-carton from Whole Foods.


Tada!