Saturday 16 April 2016

Sally ~ Layer of alien eggs

I don't know a lot about chooks but find our 'Sally Girl', as we call her, to be quite a fascinating character. Normally she is happy to get into her cage around 5pm each evening and then I go inside to cook dinner. However during the week she absolutely refused to go to bed so I left her for a while while I got the dinner on and went outside when it was almost dark to see where she was. I couldn't find her for a while and then I found her on top of the compost heap and when she saw me she very happily ran into her cage and settled down for the night or whatever that is in chook talk. I noticed though that she had just laid an egg and when I took it inside and had a look at it I saw that it was the weirdest egg I had ever seen....hence the description of an alien egg!

If I was Farmer Liz from Eight Acres or Sally from Jembella Farm, I would have known exactly why our Sally laid such an odd looking egg. However I knew that some of our Down to Earth Forum members would know so I posted a photo of the alien egg in the hope that they would diagnose what the problem was. I was wondering why a chook would lay an egg at 6pm when she normally lays her eggs in the morning and she did lay another egg the next morning by the way.

As it turned out, some of the members thought it was a 'Body checked egg' where the shell gets cracked during the calcification process and a layer of calcium is deposited over the crack before the egg is laid. How amazing is that? Did you know chooks were so clever?


I was given a link to the article Common Egg Quality Problems on Backyard Chickens.com and it is a very informative article. On reading through it I looked at the photo of a 'Slab sided or flat sided egg' in No.11 in that article and I think that is much the same shape of egg. Causes of these problems don't seem to apply to Sally though unless she had a fright. Other causes are overcrowding and stress apparently but she has the life of Riley and wanders around all day digging in my veggies and spreading mulch all over the backyard.




I have had to scout around to find anything sturdy enough to cover my seedlings to stop her digging around them so the garden looks a bit more strange than usual these days.
 

So if you keep chooks and know what is wrong with this egg do let me know. The egg Sally laid the next morning was perfectly normal. I would love to know why she laid an egg so late in the day. There is nothing around to frighten her apart from next door's cats that roam around our yard all the time but she would be used to them by now. It's all a mystery to me ;-)

Autumn arrived with a cool breeze from down south during the week and I am starting to think about digging out the winter clothes. The nights are getting chilly and the days warm up but I think we have said goodbye to our 30C days of the past few weeks. The CEO has got his gardening mojo back and is doing some much overdue weeding so next week I hope I will have room to plant more seedlings and put a fence around them for protection  from our Sally girl. Who would have thought one chook could do so much damage. LOL!

 

20 comments:

  1. Fascinating! how does the chook even know to do that?! The mind boggles

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    1. Phil, the link we were given on the D2E forums about common egg problems is really worth saving for future reference as you might need it in the future with your new girls.

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  2. Freaky looking egg. I've never seen that before. Thanks for sharing it. :)

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    1. I think it almost looks like something that has been sewn and mended.

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  3. That is a weird looking egg! I haven't seen that in our 10 years of raising chickens. She must be very special :)

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    1. Goodnes me Jes, I thought I would be the only person who didn't know what the problem was as I don't know a lot about chooks. Perhaps this is a very unusual occurrence.

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  4. Without having read the articles, but seeing the picture of the egg, my first guess would be calcium deficiency. Does Sally have access to shell grit? You can purchase large bags, relatively cheaply from a produce store.

    The egg could have ruptured while it was forming, if there isn't enough calcium in her system. It makes for a paper thin shell and so it won't take much to perforate it. So the extra layer may have be developed over the top, before it was laid.

    It could also mean age too. I don't know how old Sally is, but older hens lay really weird eggs sometimes, simply because they aren't in their prime and it takes a lot more nutrients to make the same kind of egg, as when they were young.

    I hope that helps.

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    1. Chris, we do have some eggs from the other chooks and they have calcium deposits on them as they were breaking their eggs so my hubby gave them extra calcium to harden their eggshells. They look different from this egg. As far as I know Sally is a young chook as they were a gift to my friend at Christmas and then she gave Sally to us when she was pecking the other chooks.

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  5. now I shall always know you as Chicken Mama in my thoughts ;)

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    1. Ha ha Sue. The way Sally follows me around I have been beginning to think she might see me as her mother. LOL!

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  6. I have no clue about your chookie laying weird eggs but I am loving this cooler weather. We have had some ripper days of sunshine and no wind with temps just at about 20C. Nights are cool and great for sleeping. How I love autumn over summer! Comfort food comes to mind of casseroles and lamb shanks in the slow cooker - stop!

    Cheers - Joolz xx

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    1. Joolz, I agree about the nights being great for sleeping a bit better. The extended summer temps were just getting a bit too much and it is nice to start having soups once again.

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  7. Chel that's an extraordinary egg. Poor Sally, I can imagine her squeezing that one out and wondering what the heck is going on. I still have much to learn about the workings of the inside of the hen, so I was interested to read the explanation from one of the forum readers. Thanks for sharing and allowing us all to grow our egg knowledge.

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    1. Sally, that link from Backyardchickens.com is really informative. I must go back and have a better look at that website and see what other info I can glean.

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  8. I know nothing of help for chicken eggs, just wanted to say wow on the flower! That is just beautiful!!

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    1. Kathy, my husband collects Bromeliads. That particular one has a red centre.

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  9. Since you say she only just laid it, perhaps she literally laid an egg when she saw you coming. (LOL - miss me?) That would scare me. I'd be worried i'd some how be turned into a craft project.

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    1. Ha ha, Lynda. Yes I do miss you and it is time you started blogging once again.

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  10. I didn't even know you had a chook Chel (due to my erratic blog reading lately!) As soon as my old Smudge passes on I will definitely find a spot in my yard for a chook or two. Interesting egg!

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  11. Hutchy, Sally was given to us by a friend who was given three chooks for Christmas. Sally pecked the others badly so we inherited her. Hubby put her in with the other chooks he looks after 'down the back' and they pecked her so now she wanders around behind me out in the yard near the house and gets locked up at night by herself. I know practically nothing about chooks by the way. LOL!

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