Stories tagged eggs
Spring is springing, and birds are nesting, and you can be a part of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's NestWatch project. They provide the training. You can observe natural nest sites or nest boxes, and your observations get permanently archived in North America's largest breeding bird database. The data collected helps scientists better understand threats to bird species. Pretty cool.
Tags : when to eat eggs from young chickens
hey, does anyone know when to start eating the eggs from young chickens? Mine have started laying small eggs and I have noticed that the whites are sort of milky and gelatinous, and not clear and runny like store bought eggs. Is this normal? Of course I'm asking after I just ate several of them. They tasted ok, but would love some feedback of anyone is in the know.
thanks
On Saturday, May 26, Buzz blogger Thor Carlson emailed the staff here at the Science Museum of Minnesota that our resident peregrine falcon Athena's first egg had hatched:
Athena the peregrine falcon was quite agitated this morning and I think midday we had our first hatching. Something fuzzy seems to be fluffing out from under her and than about 2 p.m. I saw her picking her beak through half of an egg shell. With the weather being pretty drippy today, she's likely keeping the little one underneath her with the three other eggs.
Stop on up at the Mississippi River Gallery and check out the latest developments...more falcon chicks should be on the way.
Three new mouths to feed: This shot, captured late Monday (5/28) afternoon, shows three new chicks. Athena's going to be busy...
Your goose is cooked!: Photo by lisso at flickr.com
The city of Chicago is looking for volunteers to go on a wild goose chase. The city has been plagued for over a decade by an ever-growing flock of Canadian geese. The birds have virtually taken over some city parks, harassing users and covering the ground with their droppings.
The city wants volunteers to find goose eggs during the nesting season. Then, wildlife control experts will shake the eggs to destroy the embryos. The geese will continue to incubate the eggs (and not lay new ones), but no goslings will hatch. Experts claim this is a more humane form of animal control than rounding up wild geese and killing them.
Drugs manufactured in eggs and milk.
Drugs from goat milk Farm animals are being modified genetically to produce milk and eggs containing pharmaceuticals. Just after ferilization "Pharmers" insert into the embryo human genes for producing proteins needed to treat humans unable to produce their own. They attach that DNA code with a gene that codes for a sugar found in milk. The therapeutic protein will then be produced within the animals milk.
Pharm animal drug approved
GTC Biotherapeutics anti-clotting agent, ATryn, is the first government-approved drug from transgenic animals. It replaces human protein antithrombin, which helps prevent blood clots that could lead to a stroke or heart attack. About one in every 5,000 people has a genetic deficiency of this protein. One goat can produce a kilogram of antithrombin each year. It would take 50,000 people to donate that same amount.
Chickens can lay medicinal eggs
Chickens can also be modified to produce human proteins in the albumen of their eggs. Origen Therapeutic scientists hope to breed a chicken that will produce the entire range of human antibodies in its eggs.
Source article: Wired.com
This series of photos, taken over 24 days, shows a hummingbird hatching and leaving its nest. (Click through all 5 pages for the full series.) Cool!
I've noticed a lot of dead fledglings and raided nests lately. Sometimes, mixed in with all the broken eggshells, I find an unhatched baby bird. And that got me wondering: are grocery store eggs fertilized? How come you never come across one with an embryo or a little chicken inside? If they're not, why does a chicken spend the energy required to produce unfertilized eggs?
Egg (and chicken): (Photo by Peter Cooper)
When you google "are chicken eggs fertilized?" you get a lot of responses. Guess lots of other people had the same question.
The answer is that chickens will lay eggs even when they've had no contact with a rooster. According to the "Ask a Scientist" feature of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute,
"If an egg has been fertilized, then the embryo inside has already divided several times but remains a group of unspecialized cells [at the time the egg is laid]. When the egg is incubated at about 37 to 38 °C, the embryonic cells differentiate to form a chick, which will hatch after 21 days. If the egg has not been fertilized, then the oocyte [or egg cell] within will never grow or divide, and the egg will never hatch. The eggs you buy at the supermarket are eggs that have never been fertilized.
Domestic chickens lay one egg every 26 to 28 hours (about one egg a day) for a period of 4 to 6 days. In between periods of egg laying, the hen rests. Wild birds may rest for months before laying more eggs, but domestic hens, specially bred for abundant egg production, may rest for as little as 1 day between egg-laying periods."
In commercial egg operations, hens are kept away from roosters, and the eggs are collected as they're laid. Chickens raised to produce eggs only need to mate to replace hens that get too old to lay eggs.
Sometimes you come across a grocery store egg that contains a blood spot. I was told, as a child, that a blood spot indicated a fertilized egg. But that's not so, according to the American Egg Board. Instead,
" Contrary to popular opinion, these tiny [blood] spots do not indicate a fertilized egg. Rather, they are caused by the rupture of a blood vessel on the yolk surface during formation of the egg or by a similar accident in the wall of the oviduct. Less than 1% of all eggs produced have blood spots.
Mass candling methods reveal most eggs with blood spots and those eggs are removed but, even with electronic spotters, it is impossible to catch all of them. As an egg ages, the yolk takes up water from the albumen to dilute the blood spot so, in actuality, a blood spot indicates that the egg is fresh. Both chemically and nutritionally, these eggs are fit to eat. The spot can be removed with the tip of a knife, if you wish."
What about those weird white stringy bits you see when you crack an egg? The American Egg Board says they're called chalazae:
"[Chalazae (singular=chalaza) are] ropey strands of egg white which anchor the yolk in place in the center of the thick white. They are neither imperfections nor beginning embryos.
The more prominent the chalazae, the fresher the egg. Chalazae do not interfere with the cooking or beating of the white and need not be removed, although some cooks like to strain them from stirred custard."
Here's a neat site about the structure of a chicken egg.
And another one about how a hen lays an egg.
UPDATE - Wednesday, June 14th
One of the falcon chicks spent part of the day learning to fly. The others are doing a lot of looking and wing-flapping, and will be joining their nestmate soon.
Peregrine chicks: Photo taken by the High Bridge web cam between 8 and 9 am, Friday, June 9.
UPDATE - Friday., June 9th
The little fluffballs are gaining feathers fast and looking more like adult peregrines every day. They've been flapping their wings and looking over the edge a lot. We expect them to fledge--leave the nest--sometime before June 16. See today's comment for more information.
All four chicks have hatched!: Yeah! Four hungry mouths to feed.
UPDATE - Friday., May 5th
All four of Athena's chicks have hatched now! Congratulations to Athena and her new Peregrine Falcon family. As far as we can tell from the pictures the fourth egg must have hatched around 5pm yesterday, Thur. May 4th.
One more to go: Athena seems to look straight at the camera and we have only one more egg to hatch.
Courtesy Excel energy
UPDATE - Thu., May 4th
Three of Athena's chicks have hatched and you can see them crowding around the one brown egg that hasn't hatched yet.
Three mouths to feed: One of Athena's chicks raises its mouth for food, Thur. morning.
Wed., May 3rd
Athena can be seen feeding two of her chicks on Xcel's Falcon Cam. You can keep updated by watching the new pictures appear every couple minutes in the daily photos section.
Athena feeding her chicks: Check out Athena droping food into her little chicks' mouths. So cute!
Update from atop the giant smokestack at the High Bridge power plant here in Saint Paul and down the street from the Science Museum:
"Athena's" eggs have started to hatch.
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