Check out these eggs. First is a jumbo size egg, then a regular egg, then a bantam egg, then a bantam egg that I call the ping pong ball (see next post) and then on the end is a tiny little bitty egg I found in our Birchens pen the other day. Too cute
The ping pong ball egg. This is one I found in our Blue Cochin pen. One hen lays more rounded eggs, but this one is completely rounded.
That's really a neat line-up!
You should keep the round one i have never seen one like that *Thanks for the cool pic :~)*
You swipe that round one from some poor turtle!
We are getting some that are about double jumbo. I cracked one for my breakfast the other day expecting 2 or 3 yolks. Only one, about 2" across!
We have one hen that always seems to lay really big eggs. They don't even fit in an egg carton sometimes.
And no, didn't swipe the round one from a turtle :)
Love the pic, smedge!
We always keep the funny ones for a while. Don't have any bantam eggs though. Pullet eggs can be fairly cute, but...
LOL How cute!! Love the round one.. I think it's fun to gather them and find the weird ones..
I had a hiccup egg too today! Here are the last 3 days eggs after rinsing. The hiccup egg isn't hard to find!
I can't believe how tiny those little eggs can be i have one the size of a pea.
Nice spread of eggs you got there Claire any Flan in the making :~)
Ha, no missing that little one in there is it. Hiccup eggs are so funny. Can you imagine if one of those would actually hatch into a chick. I know it wouldn't, but it would be a hilariously small chick.
That would be like one of those tiny little yellow fluffball chicks that you see on easter basket decorations. That would be unbearably cute. I think the quail chicks are pretty close to that size!
Harmony, funny you should ask.....this is my oven RIGHT NOW!!
smedgekles, what kind of hen is it that lays the big eggs for you?
I feel sorry for 2 of our girls at time. There eggs fit the jumbo cartons most of the time.
I believe I could cook that right outside my door.. it just hit 108..
I'm hungry now.. and can't cook in this weather.. :(
Well i did and experiment last year and i added a tiny egg to my bater not pea size but smaller than the normal bantam egg.
Surprise it hatched the chick was smaller than the others and he grew slowly i had to place him with some other chicks when those he hatched with out grew him.
Then those out grew him and he was placed with some other chicks his own size.
When all was said and done he ended up with his 4th group which were some young chickens that were 3 months younger than he was and he was fully grown and their size.
He did eventually grow to full size but it took him a long time and several moves to keep him with others his own size.
I sold him last fall but i won't be experimenting with any small eggs again
Ugh, I'm glad we don't get that high in Iowa (as a rule). I use my crock pot when the weather is unbearable. Less overall heat generated.
OK, check out the size of this egg.
Yikes for the girl who layed it.
This happened a couple of years ago, but we had to keep the shell :)
We never saw one that big again. Big, but not that big.
It's with a blue egg on the picture.
CMoxen I hope you plan to share :)
Kassy the hen that lays them is a cross between a RIR and a sexlink roo. We call her Ginger. There is also another that lays really big eggs and she is RIR.
The picture is of Ginger
What an egg!
We have had a couple that looked like the shell was stretched thin it was so big.
My RIR's use to lay eggs that wouldn't fit in the jumbo cartons. Double yolks every time from 10 out of 15 hens. The eggs were huge. Clove my little black bantam hen i feel sorry for bc she lays the biggest bantam egg i've ever seen. Takes the poor girl 4 hours in the next to lay the egg.
I have a blue egger (broody now) that lays double yolks often.. Her egg is a whopper and although it's kind of an ugly blue/green color.. it is often very dark blue on one end... LOL Just funny lookin!
I wish I could take a pic of a Serama egg I have in the Hatcher.. it's a torpedo and it developed! Almost looks like a mini hot dog.. LOL
I had that feeling smedgekles, because she looks alot like the ones that layed that big egg.
We ordered buffs, but got this instead.
Great egg layer though, and big eggs.
She lays brown eggs, but that was a very light brown.......has faded some in the last 2 years too/
She's very pretty, even if she's not a buff.
We ended up with 5 of them, and one of them ended up being my nursing home chicken for a few years. She was blind in one eye, couldn't walk on one leg at first, but she got around. Later she started to limp on the one leg.
She was kept pen away from the others so they couldn't pick on her. I changed her cage all the time. And in the summer we would put her out in a fenced in area to eat grass and bug.
And believe it or not, she still layed big brown eggs.
ZZ we have a blue egg layer that lays pretty big eggs too. They are just a year old but hers are good size. We also got the torpedo hotdog egg from one of our RIR. Too funny indeed.
Kassy she is a pretty girl.
This pic is one of our Buff Orpingtons, Buffy, is that what your was suppose to be? Her back is a little scrappy from the roo. She is a sweet girl.
yes, was suppose to be a buff, should have gotten 2 of them. That's what the order was anyway, but the feedmill messed up.
Guess that's why they gave us 16 chicks instead of the 12 that he ordered.
They told him they gave him the extra chicks that were left there, but I think they did it because they knew they messed up.
Will start a new thred with a picture of our chicks when they were young and tell you what he ordered and how bad they messed up.
BTW Buffy is very pretty :)
Well what you got is pretty. Not sure what she is but pretty anyway.
Thanks! Buffy is the smallest of the 4 hens we had and the sweetest and very tame. We lost Peaches last evening to a coyote (we think). We also have Sandy and Goldie and we have one that hatched a couple of months back that we know is a hen and we named her Autumn.
Ohhh, so sorry to hear you lost one to a coyote. We have Coyote's in this area too, so our girls stay penned in unless we are out there with them. And they are in their secure coop all locked in at night. We lost the last leghorn we had to neighbors dogs. They felt bad about it, but what can you do?
We keep ours penned too but sometimes let them out to forage. We were outside most the time, but we went in the house for a bit and most were heading back in the pens. It was long enough for one to get her, she must have ventured out a bit farther than the others.
Hey Smedge!!! I also have one of those teeny tiny eggs. I've had it for two years now. I wanted to break it open to see what was inside, but, I also wanted to preserve it for my customers to see. It's always a great conversation piece.
I was thinking about your place and the snakes down there. just what all kinds do you have? Are their any areas where the children can't go? That would make me a nervous wreck. You must be a very brave lady. I would die if I put my hand in for an egg and pulled out a snake. I shiver just thinking about it. I think I must be a coward at heart. There are just some things that drive me up the wall and snakes are one of them. Hay
Hay I don't stick my hands where I can't see what is there first!
We have lots of rat snakes aka chicken snakes and even garden snakes. Also copperheads and I've heard water moccosins (sp?) near the pond hence the reason I tell the kids to be extra careful there.
Last year when we went berry picking out back we ran into a copperhead. My husband took care of it with a stick or rather club he was carrying. We called the kids and had them come look at it so they knew what one looked like if they ever ran across one so they would know it is a really bad one.
My husband has quite the senses for snakes. Once we were up in MO on their family farm walking the field with his sister and her husband. His sister walked down a path and we were behind her , my husband suddenly shot the ground. We were all shocked wondering why he shot the ground since we saw nothing. There was a snake right where she had stepped, none of us saw it. We asked how he knew. He said when she stepped away the grass kept moving and he knew it was a snake. I guess growing up in that makes you very aware of everything.
When I was a kid we had lots of snakes but black widow spiders I think were worse. There were a lot of them and I don't like spiders.
The coyote don't come close to the house during the day or evening here, or rather at my boyfriends place. He's close to the UP Michigan boarder. They may come a little closer at night when it is dark out, but by then all the girls are tucked away safe.
And I don't even remember the last time I saw a snake. My boyfriend said he saw one last week, but a harmless one.
Coyotes here will come right up on the porch if there's no one out there. I sat at my boyfriends house many times just on the other side of the window from then & watched them play on the concrete porch. They are quite interesting to watch if they aren't eating your chickens.
When I took care of my mom, I was in central Wisconsin. No one ever mentioned seeing a Coyote there. I'll have to ask my nephew if he has ever seen one, as he is big into hunting.
There we just had a lot of wild turkeys and deer, and sometimes people would see a black bear. I saw one only once. Was taking my mom to a Dr. appointment, and came over a hill and the bear was crossing the road.
We have little garden snakes, not poisonous or anything. My hubby said he ran over one in the driveway recently that was the biggest he'd seen. The snakes are only a problem for stealing the eggs (and for baby chicks), right? They don't bother a fully-grown chicken? What about bantams and smaller chickens?
I didn't know what a black widow spider was. I am not really bothered by spiders in general and have never lived where there were poisonous spiders, at least that I knew of. So when I was down in Douglas, AZ, a few years back cleaning out my aunt's house after she died, I was just cleaning away, no gloves, sticking my hands all over the place. Came to find out there were black widows everywhere! Even places I had been sticking my hands. Boy, was I lucky! I was careful after I was told. Used a broom to sweep many of them off her front door (she had never used it, only went in and out the back door).
Oh my, I cringe when I read the part that you were sticking your hands in stuff with spiders. EEEEKKK
We also have Brown Recluse spiders. Those are very very bad. My brother n law got bitten by one on his foot. It was one of the grousest things. The bite sight will literally get so grouse looking, it is like your flesh is rotting. And, to top it off, I've heard that you won't know at first you have been bitten by one till you have a nasty sore from it. I'm very careful sticking my hands in stuff, don't want to meet up with one of those.
Snakes of the garden variety I don't think bother chickens or eggs. Rat snakes will eat eggs and baby chicks even good sized babies. I don't think they will mess with a bantam size or large chicken, they go more for the eggs or small chicks. We have snakes 4 and 5 feet long sometimes. Good to have them for some things, but when they start eating my chicks or eggs I don't take kindly to them. We keep golf balls in some nests.
smedgekles, you can keep those snakes down there :)
I liked the idea of the golf balls, How many have they eaten? LOL
My chickens ate a snake here a couple of weeks ago. Smallish garden snake, but still. They all were fighting to get it. Ick.
