Struggling with a 3rd world problem

[wdfifteen]

Our eggs are too small.
There, I said it.

Our chickens aged out and one egg per week was not paying the bills, so I gave them to a family for pets and went on the search for younger hens.

When we moved here 5 years ago we gave our chicken coop and 5 hens to one of my wife's close friends. When she found out we were bird-less she was excited to offer us 3 of her pullets. She was so happy to be paying us back. Sounded like a good deal, but I discovered too late that their pullets are bantams, not full sized chickens. Wife says we can't give them back, it would break her heart. They lay little 52 gram eggs and I'm used to 80 gram eggs, so I need two of them a day for breakfast. They are going to have to lay eggs at twice the rate of our old hens to keep up, and I'm not sure they're up to it.



The little bantam eggs weigh in at 51 grams, which is almost the size of Kroger's "large" eggs (56 grams), but still small.



Breakfast this morning. The bantam eggs have proportionately larger yolks than full sized chicken eggs. I'm not a fan.

[john70t]

A lot of 'jumbo' eggs have double yolks which might not be natural. Could be worse. Get a few more more chickens I say.

[GH85Carrera]

Just get some new chicks, and eat the under-producing chickens. I suspect no third world citizen hesitated at all to eat the low egg producing chickens.

My brother ended up "inheriting" a chicken that his wife quickly named. She whent for a year and not one egg. Then while enjoying the back yard, and chicken hawk tried to have a meal. The chicken survived with just a lot of missing feathers on her butt. Then she had two eggs, the next day two more, and then one the next day. Now it is 6 months later, and not one more egg.

[stevej37]

I'm with you on egg size...I only buy jumbo's.

But I have a question....
Let's say some night you forget to lock the hen-house and your prize rooster (Lil Jerry) succeeds in breaking in and nails your favorite two yolk laying hen (Hot Henna)
You know what happened and decide to let Henna incubate the infant and raise it. (right to life)

My question is....does the hatched egg from Henna show two chicks or just one with double the yolk (food)?

I think about this every time I eat a double yolker.

[911 Rod]

Easy. Eat chickens. Get better chickens.

[stevej37]

^^^ It's “Eat Mor Chikin”

[cstreit]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

Breakfast this morning. The bantam eggs have proportionately larger yolks than full sized chicken eggs. I'm not a fan.

To each his own. I'd prefer a higher yolk to white ratio myself.

[stevej37]

I googled the answer to my question (post 4)
Here it is for the curious.....

two chicks
One of the most striking variations is the rare fertilised double-yolk – and yes, this can result in two chicks being born from the same egg. Two yolks become two chicks.

[Evans, Marv]

May be a characteristic of our area, but the "large eggs" in the stores are "smalls" if you go back several decades. It's like everything else.

[A930Rocket]

You need to cut back on the eggs anyway!

[juanbenae]

My neighbors keep like 7-8 laying hens that are comming up to their 3rd summer. they keep a covered pen and they do really, really well once the weather warms up with each doing one a day or so. I take my veggie, salad makins scraps to them all year round so i get a dozen once a week or so. no onion scrap as they don't digest well apparently.

so dam funny watching the bird tending of his two daughters, Maggie fetch and heard them from around the property with a really long stick and calling them by name back to the pen after them ranging a few hours a day..

dude grows some top shelf cannabis too.