The inner workings of a chicken are mysterious. In 24 short hours, a hen can create an embryo, build a sac of albumin around that yolk, then pack the whole thing away inside a hard egg shell. But sometimes the production line doesn’t go according to plan.
If you keep chickens, you’re likely familiar with double-yolked eggs. This is a simple malfunction — two yolks are created rather than one, similar to the way human twins form within a mother’s womb. In case you’re curious, yes it’s possible for a fertilized, double-yolked egg to hatch two chicks…although the more common scenario involves only one chick living long enough to poke its beak out of the shell.
But what about less common egg malfunctions? I’ve had two reports of interesting oddities this week, first the minuscule fairy egg and then a rather astonishing triple yolker, one yolk of which was enclosed within its own individual shell.
How about you? What’s the craziest thing you ever found when you brought home an egg from the coop and cracked the shell?
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