Tales of the uneggspected

You’ll remember Dr Michael Atkins BSc (Hons), MB BS, DPM, FFPM and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, and his wife Helen from our last two issues. This is his last letter for C&E, so enjoy!

Fairy eggs

Maj is a BIG, healthy girl rehomed by the BHWT, given to us and, like some of our other luckies, she still lays eggs. But look at the size – tiny compared to her sisters’.

The egg is called a “Fairy Egg”. Crack it open and – what… no yolk, no joke, just white? PANIC??

No. They are not uncommon when a hen’s reproductive kit is not up to speed. That can be early in life or later in life (as is the case with Maj). Eggsperts say Fairy Eggs are usually nothing to be concerned about although it can occur in regular egg laying chickens if there has been a disturbance that upsets their normal egg cycle.

POP POP pops one out

We have rescued animals for many years. It started (STARTED!) with horses, pigs, ducks and geese. Our first five hens, Jessica, Ginge,Boudicca, Emily, and Poppy, came later from a friend who rescued local battery girls in a very poor state but we got them all back to full fluffy health. All but Poppy (Pop Pops) have gone ahead to Wonderland. Pops is a survivor and stopped laying years ago. Then, eggs! We put it down to her starting to steal the duck’s food. As our senior layer and thief, go for it girl!

Shell shock

Daffodil (aka “Daffodilly”) has laid eggs without a shell, sometimes with a paper-thin membrane holding it together and sometimes just white and yolk. It can be a one-off thing but can be due to a lack of calcium which is used for the shell to form.

For more information on soft shell eggs head to the hen health pages on our website at bhwt.org.uk

More tales from the coop...

We love nothing more than hearing happy hen stories, so here are a few we’ve had over the past months. If you want to share a special hen tale with us please email it to marketing@bhwt. co.uk and you may see it featured among these pages...

Felicia, submitted by Catherine Douglas

“While she is no-longer with us, Felicia was a lovely girl, always confidently seeking out human companionship and chatting importantly to you. I wish I had understood more, though I guess a lot was about corn. This picture is already quite well known across students and staff of Newcastle University’s Animal Science and Agriculture degrees as she was the backdrop to my Zoom meetings during the pandemic and beyond. As a large image towering above me online, she has kept her beady eye on proceedings (I lecture,you might have guessed). She was less helpful if I was trying to send emails in the garden. She also featured in many videos for my animal welfare lectures and for summer schools, so she did her bit for chicken-kind too. Dear hen, sadly missed.”

Cluck Norris and Hennifer Anniston, submitted by Karyn Campbell

“We adopted five hens from Denny earlier this year. They were pretty weak, with very few feathers and needed a lot of help initially. But our nine and 11 year olds have been helping with their daily care, providing much needed TLC and now they are full of life, full of fluffy feathers, strength and personality. All five are laying eggs daily and enjoying roaming the garden, sunbathing and snuggling up in the coop at night or having a cuddle with their humans. They are absolutely thriving and have been wonderful additions to our family!”