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Chickens are marvelous birds that are so productive; they’ve become an integral part of our society. We use these birds for show, as pets, and for meat and egg production. Egg production is a massive commercial business, and is growing into a personal experience for many who choose to raise their own chickens for eggs. You may want to know how a chicken lays eggs and how many eggs does a chicken lay? Few stop to think about how a chicken produces eggs, we simply purchase them in a neat carton at the grocery store. If we raise them ourselves, we merely collect them from the nesting box without so much as a second thought. Yet, a lot goes into laying an egg, and chickens are constantly doing it! For starters, all female chickens lay eggs, but some hens lay more than others. Interestingly enough, chickens have one ovary, and one oviduct, unlike other animals that have two. The entire egg, except the yolk, is formed in the oviduct. When ovulation takes place, the yoke is released and placed into the hen’s abdomen. Once in the abdomen, the egg enters the oviduct, and rapidly enters the magnum section. In the magnum section the shape of the egg is determined. It’s in the uterus that the shell is added; the shell is mostly made of calcium carbonate. From there, it takes 20 hours for the shell to form. During this time, there is another egg waiting in the wings to be deposited. In other words, chickens are constantly laying eggs! Once the pigment is determined (in the last hours of formation) the egg is deposited through the oviduct small end first, and out the chicken large end first. The egg may fill the shell when it is layed, but shortly after it will form an air pocket between the egg and the membrane. If you don’t have a rooster, then don’t expect any of your eggs to be fertilized. However your hens will behave the same whether or not the eggs are fertilized, and this is called, “brooding.” When a hen broods, she will sit on her eggs for an extended period of time, causing them to deteriorate faster. You can prevent this, as well as the occasional grumpiness when you try to remove the eggs from the nest, by regularly removing the eggs on a daily basis if possible. Don’t be alarmed if your hen lays smaller eggs with brittle shells at first, as this usually happens when a chicken first starts to lay eggs. Also, there may be a drop of blood on the shell of the egg, but this is also nothing to worry about. If you see more than a drop of blood on the eggs of a particular chicken, then take them to the vet for a clinical visit. You can tell if a chicken will lay a good production of eggs by the space between their pubic bones. If there is a two-finger space, then your chicken will most likely lay a good amount of eggs (one a day is not uncommon). Hens that may not lay as well will have little to no space between their pubic bones. Traditionally, good egg layers will have yellow or white skin pigment as well. How a chicken lays eggs is an amazing process that is in constant motion. A lot of work goes into providing us with nutritious eggs! One thing that many of us wonder is how many eggs does a chicken lay and while it may not be important to know exactly how many a hen lays, it is important to have an appreciation for it. Fact is, there are many things about chickens you might want to learn about before you consider raising them in your backyard.
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