Egg fertilization

Quality

Can someone please explain to me, how hens eggs get fertilized and how do you know if the egg is going to hatch or not??

I am a bit miffed when it comes to this,...

brianmc

This may all sound mockingly simple - it's not meant to though.

If you keep a cockerel with the hens then the majority of eggs will most likely be fertile, if they don't hatch after the normal length of time then they weren't fertile. I'm more used to smaller birds where you can see light through the egg and tell whether there's something growing inside - I don't know if there's a similar trick for chickens.

The cockerel fertilizes the eggs in much the same manner as any other creature but obviously, before the egg develops fully inside the hen.

myjugsarehuge

I keep hens and ducks. All our eggs are probably fertile as we have a cockerel and a drake, but we eat most of them as eggs will only develop if they are placed under a heat source, either their mother, a broody or in an incubator. Hen eggs take about 21 days to hatch, duck eggs 28. You can usually tell after 10 days or so if the eggs are fertile. If you "candle" them ie shine a bright torch through the egg in a dark room, you should see veins & the developing bird.

When a hen goes broody, which usually happens with our silkies in the spring/summer, we place either hen or duck eggs under them, depending on what we want to hatch out at the time.

Quality

so do some eggs just not hatch???

and would you be eating some of the eggs already fertilized if you just take them away?

How often does a hen lay?

Our man in Havana

Hens will normally lay an egg a day (I had ex-battery hens) some birds stop laying during the dark winter months.

When you crack an egg if you see a red spot that means the egg had been fertilised & could of become a chicken/duck/etc.

Why the interest??

myjugsarehuge

We eat our eggs all the time. Like I said they do not develop at all if you take them away every morning. They only develop into chicks if you put them in an incubator or if the hen sits on them and only certain breeds do this at certain times of the year.

The red spot on the yolk isn't a sign of a fertilised egg, its just a slight "tear" as the egg is formed in the oviduct. Hens with no contact with cockerels have this sometimes.

Quality

It is just something that has always been nagging at me,

My Aunt used to have hens and ducks years ago and she used to send me home with an egg, She told me if I kept it warm enough it may hatch,

I could just imagine, a chicken ending up in my hotpress!!

Thanks for all the help,