The Chickens & the Eggs
Eggs are a pretty common food commodity, but many folks aren’t clued into the features that makes them such spectacular technological specimens. Here’s a little FAQ:
Why don’t you refridgerate your eggs?
A fresh-laid egg has an outer coating called a “bloom” that blocks air and bacteria from entering the egg.
Eggs sold in grocery stores have had that high-tech bloom washed off—there’s no longer a protective coating to fill in the pores in the eggshell that let air and bacteria pass through. So they have to be refrigerated or they will spoil quickly.
Unwashed eggs can be left at room temperature for at least a month with little to no loss of quality! Just give the egg a gentle rinse under tap water before you crack it open. If you’re not sure whether an egg is still good, put it in a bowl of water. If if floats, toss it. That means enough air and bacteria have passed into the egg to spoil it.
Do you still get eggs from hens if you don’t have a rooster?
Yes! Many people are familiar with the fact that human females with active reproductive systems will release an egg from their ovaries about once per month. Domestic hens are bred to release an egg about once per day! However, unless a rooster is present to fertilize the egg, it will never turn into a baby chick, no matter how long a hen sits on it.
Can you tell if an egg has been fertilized?
Not really! Each egg has a barely noticeable white disk, about the width of a pencil eraser, attached to the yolk. If it’s not fertilized, it’s called the germinal disk. If it is fertilized, it’s an embryo, but at the time the egg comes out of the chicken, you can’t really tell the difference, because the embryo goes dormant — stops developing — as soon as the hen lays the egg. The yolk is not the embryo! It’s a nutritional sac meant to sustain a baby chick until it hatches.
If an embryo goes dormant as soon as the hen lays an egg, how do you get a baby chick?
Remember that high-tech bloom on the egg? It’s meant to keep the egg fresh and viable until a hen is ready to activate the embryo with her body heat. In the wild, birds will lay an egg every few days, and they won’t start incubating their eggs until they have a good-sized clutch of them. That means the egg has to keep fresh not only for the few weeks it takes the bird to lay enough to make it worth her while to sit on them, but also the time it takes the embryo to mature inside the egg and hatch.
A hen “goes broody” when she’s ready to hatch eggs. It’s a biochemical change that slows digestion and increases body heat. That increased body heat is what reactivates the dormant embryo inside the egg. The magic temperature is 99.5F. A hen will often pull off her belly feathers to get more heat to her eggs, and she’ll turn the eggs with her beak or wings from day to day to make sure they’re all getting even amounts of heat. During this 21-day incubation period, a hen will only come off her eggs about once per day, for a quick snack and a poop. Then she’s back on the job of incubating her babies.
Most domestic chickens are bred not to go broody—if they’re broody, they won’t lay an egg, and that reduces productivity for the farmer. But occassionally a hen will go broody, and the hen keeper has to decide whether to let the hen go ahead and hatch some eggs, or to pull the eggs out from under her. Eventually, after the biochemical change has worn off—usually three or four weeks—she’ll hop off the nest and go back to life as usual.
Are brown eggs better than white ones?
Egg color has no effect on egg quality. Most egg shells are white, made up of calcium carbonate. Some breeds of chicken deposit a layer of pigment on top of the shell, which can turn them various shades of brown, or even speckled. Some breeds build a bluish pigment into their shells, resulting in a beautiful, naturally pale blue egg. Some breeds make blue eggs and then deposit a brownish coating on top, making the eggs look olive-colored. We keep a variety of breeds, from Welsummers to Cuckoo Bluebar Blue-Eggers, so that we have a gorgeous assortment of colors. But they’re all equally healthy and delicious.
How many years do hens lay eggs?
Once they reach maturity—at about 25-30 weeks old—hens will lay eggs consistently for about two years, and then less regularly after that, until they reach “henopause.” Commercial laying hens will lay daily, especially when provided with an artificial light source in the winter. But they also have short, sad lives. Heritage breeds lay less frequently —maybe five eggs per week—and hardly at all when the winter days are short. We never force egg laying in the winter by introducing artificial light. We get fewer eggs, but our hens get a much-needed vacation from laying—especially during the cold, hard winter months—and they live longer, happier lives.
About a third of our flock are retirees who, having laid consistently for two-to-three years, and then on and off for another two-to-three years, get to enjoy the good life, pecking corn and eating worms without having to squeeze out another egg for the rest of their lives!
Is a “vegetarian diet” better for chickens?
No way! You might see high-priced eggs in the grocery store that boast “vegetarian” diets for their chickens, but that is not natural, and it certainly doesn’t improve the quality of the egg. Chickens are omnivores. They eat grass, leafy greens and grains. They even love watermelon, grapes or cantaloupe as a special treat. But they also eat worms, bugs, slugs and even small frogs. All of that protein and a varied diet make for a high-quality, nutrient dense egg. In the winter, when our hens can’t forage much, we offer them dried meal worms, and we grow flats of wheat grass to keep them healthy, and their eggs nutritious.
A rich, golden yolk is the sign of a nutritous egg. But watch out—some commercial producers add pigments to their feed to artificially boost the yolk color, with no nutritional benefit at all. We supplement our hens’ foraging with organic feed from Lightening Tree Farm, grown locally here in the Hudson Valley. No artificial colors or flavors!
On the weekends, we sell our eggs from our driveway on Pine Bush Road, in Stone Ridge. Stop by and pick up a dozen! We hope you enjoy them as much as we do!