Egg yolks

Colilfc

What is an egg yolk (besides my mother)? A chicken before it comes to life? If it is that how come we never get a chic inside when opening one?

admiralofthefleet

i dont know. its some mad yoke

chordtype

Is your brain scrambled trying to figure it out?

Saila

its the yellow thing in the middle of the egg
just like black pudding enjoy it, but dont ask where it comes from

RichieC

I enjoy eggs too much to think about it.

Colilfc

chordtype wrote: »

Is your brain scrambled trying to figure it out?

it really is fried alright.

Rabies

An unfertilized egg

chordtype

Look it up in an eggcyclopedia

TeddyTedson

the placenta of the chicken. yummy

ardinn

Dear Pablo: I heard a rumor that you can incubate store-bought eggs and actually hatch chicks. Can this be true?

Contrary to common belief, a rooster is not required for hens to produce eggs. With this said, most commercially produced eggs are laid by hens that are isolated in cramped wire cages with no roosters present (sadly, the rooster chicks are sometime sent to their deaths in a shredder or are processed into "chicken flavor"). More and more stores are offering "fertile eggs" or "fertilized eggs" and there is a chance that regular "cage free" hens have access to a rooster. You can also obtain fertile eggs from a local egg farmer or farmers' market.

So you can obtain fertilized eggs but are they really capable of hatching? One problem is that store-bought eggs are not raised specifically for hatching and that there is no guarantee that any of the eggs are fertilized. The most obvious issue is probably that store-bought eggs are usually refrigerated, which you would think might kill any chances of hatching a chick. So, is there any chance that is is possible?

Is It Really Possible To Hatch Store-Bought Eggs?
A discussion thread on www.backyardchickens.com about this very topic has recently gained in popularity. According to numerous forum participants including GardeNerd and dovecanyon they have successfully incubated and hatched eggs purchased at Trader Joe's! Why would anyone do this? "I think there's something neat about giving a wonderful life to a peep that originated from parents kept in horrible factory farm conditions," writes le neige homme.

See Them For Yourself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycjl-Mh3oFY&feature=player_embedded

How Do I Hatch My Own?
First, you need to figure out if any of your eggs are fertilized. Start with eggs labeled "fertile" or "fertilized." Next you will need to crack one open. You need to look for a white mark on the yolk. This white mark will be perfectly round if the egg is fertile (called a blastoderm). If the egg is not fertile the white mark will not be perfectly round and may be smaller (called a blastodisc). If you find a reasonable proportion of fertile eggs you have a chance of actually hatching one.

The freshness of the eggs will be important. If they have been refrigerated for too long they may not be viable. Move them to an incubator and wait. There was some indication on the discussion board that the store-bought eggs take longer to hatch and that the chicks are not as vigorous. If you are not a self-proclaimed "hatchaholic" like many of the discussion board participants, this might be a little too much effort. For the rest of us there are local hatcheries and farm supply stores that would be happy to sell us already-hatched little peeps. Just be sure that you know what you are getting yourself into.

Pablo Päster is a weekly columnist for TreeHugger.com, an experienced greenhouse gas engineer and the Senior Environmental Program Manager at Hara Software. Send your questions to Pablo(at)TreeHugger.com or submit the via this form and connect to his RSS feed.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/07/ask-pablo-can-you-hatch-store-bought-eggs.php

Tar.Aldarion

Rabies wrote: »

An unfertilized egg

So if it is fertilized it becomes an egg. I see some profit to be made here. $_$

Aoifey!

An unfertilised egg

TeddyTedson

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

So if it is fertilized it becomes an egg. I see some profit to be made here. $_$

What was the thread with someone giving out about you before....
Do you remember it?

strobe

They are just fat, cholesterol, carbohydrates, protein, minerals and vitamins.

Them being fertilised or not has nothing to do with anything. Fertilised eggs contain a yoke too.

They are nutritious high fat, high energy food for the baby chicken.

policarp

A Hens Period. Period...

Overheal

Colilfc wrote: »

What is an egg yolk (besides my mother)? A chicken before it comes to life? If it is that how come we never get a chic inside when opening one?

the egg is unfertilised so there is no life form in there. The yolk is just a big ball of essentially Cholesterol, fats and proteins. As the chick develops this gets absorbed and used to develop the body. Thats mainly why the chicks are covered in yellow feathering when they hatch. The egg white contains more of the proteins but is mostly made up of water.

If you look closely on an egg yolk you can see this little white spot on there: thats actually the egg cell that needs to be fertilized before it becomes an embryo.

LighterGuy

Am I the only one that gets a little freaked out that when you thik of it, you're eating a chickens period?

Overheal

LighterGuy wrote: »

Am I the only one that gets a little freaked out that when you thik of it, you're eating a chickens period?

It's a bird; not a mammal.

LighterGuy

Overheal wrote: »

It's a bird; not a mammal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fy1eTe3FPU

OutlawPete

How do the farmer egg people know which egg are fertilised and which are not. Is there a chance that one day I could crack a chick into the frying pan like?

LighterGuy

Dont quote me, but i think its as simple as holding an egg up to a light and seeing if its been fertalised.


im not joking too. i remember watching something on tv about that. a very vague memory.

Overheal

OutlawPete wrote: »

How do the farmer egg people know which egg are fertilised and which are not. Is there a chance that one day I could crack a chick into the frying pan like?

Well in egg farms its a simple case of not having roosters in the population.

gonedrinking

Overheal wrote: »

Well in egg farms its a simple case of not having roosters in the population.

Yes but roosters can fly so there is no way of knowing if the egg you're eating has been fertilised or not. The chinese are filthy and eat baby chickens just before they hatch. Fcuking rank.

brianthebard

gonedrinking wrote: »

Yes but roosters can fly

em what? flap their wings about a little you mean.

gonedrinking

brianthebard wrote: »

em what? flap their wings about a little you mean.

I googled it and yahoo answers and answers.com both confirmed roosters can fly, albeit for short distances. Certainly enough to fly over a farmers fence and rape a load of ripe chicken virgins.

brianthebard

gonedrinking wrote: »

I googled it and yahoo answers and answers.com both confirmed roosters can fly, albeit for short distances. Certainly enough to fly over a farmers fence and rape a load of ripe chicken virgins.

roosters can fly as much as hens can, ie not very much. Most responsible farmers would clip the flight wings of their chickens further limiting the potential fertilization circumference.

gonedrinking

brianthebard wrote: »

Most responsible farmers would clip the flight wings of their chickens further limiting the potential fertilization circumference.

yes but you will always get irresponsible farmers, like the ones in South Korea who buried 3 million pigs alive:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGC9XtnHSU0

brianthebard

You're right that's completely comparable and not at all silly. Well done.

Tar.Aldarion

TeddyTedson wrote: »

What was the thread with someone giving out about you before....
Do you remember it?

dunno the latest thread name!
/flirts

OutlawPete wrote: »

How do the farmer egg people know which egg are fertilised and which are not. Is there a chance that one day I could crack a chick into the frying pan like?

I believe they are tested (picture people will cool uv chicken lights) but some do get through, I've had to rescue girls that were freaking out due to this.

Overheal wrote: »

Well in egg farms its a simple case of not having roosters in the population.

Chickens can change sex...den den den

Overheal

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

Chickens can change sex...den den den

:pac:

Guill

The yolk is what the chick eats in the egg. It usallt absorbs it slowly throughout incubation and on the last day before hatch it will eat as much as possible so when it hatches it can survive three days without food, while it finds its way.

When you break an egg look for the weird bit in between the yolk and clear bit. It looks cloudy, thats your chick.

gonedrinking

brianthebard wrote: »

You're right that's completely comparable and not at all silly. Well done.

Look, all I'm sayin is that some farmers are a bit off, ya know? My mate worked at a farm one summer and he said some of the things that went on were just shocking. He said the farmers:

- Put chemicals in the chips they feed to their donkeys. As a result some donkeys were born without any hind legs
- They made the pigs smoke
- They feed beef burgers to swans
- They didn't like outsiders, they like to stick to their own if you know what I mean
- One of the farmers seen a family having a picnic in a field with a pond in it, the farmer filled in the pond with concrete and then ploughed the family into the field. He then blew up the tree in the field and used the leaves to make a dress for his wife who was also his brother!
- There were big sheds but no one was ever allowed in. One day my mate sneaked into one and found there was 20 foot high chickens in them, because of all the chemicals, and those chickens were scared because they didn't know why they were so big.
- They also ran over badgers in their tractor for fun

Guill

^^^^^^I can verify this story.

Absurdum

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5jpVbEL0jc

Asphyxia

It's a chickens time of the month!

Guill

Asphyxia wrote: »

It's a chickens time of the Day!

FYP