An egg with two yolks

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I regret not taking a picture, because I don't know I will see it again. Two days ago I was 'whipping' up a quick breakfast for my son and sure enough I cracked the second egg and out popped two yolks. I am no 'young yam" as we say in these parts, and I have seen a lot of things, but this was a first for me.

I have to say I was a little freaked out by it and so I still have the eggs there probably to throw out. I figured I would do some research and sure enough I read you can sometimes get up to four or six yolks which is the record breaking number. One thing I read is that it sometimes comes from young birds. Have any of you seen it before? Perhaps it's a common thing but it surely was a first for me.
 
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I have heard of double-yolked eggs and I'm sure I have seen one or two in my time. I didn't know it was related to the age of the hen.

I think people who keep poultry are probably more familiar with them. It's a little like multiple births in humans, they happen naturally from time to time.
 
I have seen a lot of double yolkers in my time. You generally only see them in home grown eggs now a days because they are removed from circulation. After all consumers can't cope with circley cucumbers and anything other than straight carrots, so they will freak out at double yolkers. They are surprisingly common in hens. I haven't yet seen any in the ducks eggs we have though.

They are identified and removed by 2 methods, the first being their size which is often very slightly larger so that makes it easier by weight... and by shining a light through the egg (done to check it is not a chick) which also picks up on the number of yolks inside.

Double yolkers have always been prized in this household and are absolutely no reason to through out perfectly good eggs. If you don't want any more, just shine a torch through the egg and you will see how many yolks are in there. But it is absolutely nothing to worry about.
 
I have never seen double yolker eggs myself, but I have chickens who produce eggs. We give some to our neighbour and he said that twice a couple of the eggs were double yolkers.
 
I have never seen double yolker eggs myself, but I have chickens who produce eggs. We give some to our neighbour and he said that twice a couple of the eggs were double yolkers.
In certain places I have actually seen boxes of half a dozen double yolkers on sale. On one occasion that was in a supermarket!
 
Here you go. Knew I had seen it some where
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodandd.../Double-yolk-egg-boxes-launched-by-MandS.html

We all love cracking open a boiled egg to find not one but two yolks inside, but sadly, the chances of discovering a so-called “double yolker" are far from high – about 1 in 1000.
That’s all about to change however, as Marks & Spencer has started to sell boxes of eggs that all contain double yolks.
The free-range eggs, which are priced at £2.75 for a box of six, are identified as "double yolkers" through a process called “candling”.
Eggs are individually held in front of a bright light which reveals the silhouette of the yolks inside the shell.
Eggs with double yolks are usually laid by young hens who have experienced two ovulations at almost at the same time.
Marks & Spencer product developer Ali Rodham said: “We’re really excited to be selling double yolkers. Perfect for people who think the yolk is the best bit of the egg, double yolkers are not only are delicious, but they are healthy too.”
Egg yolks contain an array of vitamins and minerals, including vitamins A, D, E, and iron. Though long demonised for their cholesterol content, recent studies suggest that the high cholesterol levels in yolk do not translate into high cholesterol in the human body.
 
Amazing! And imagine the poor hen laying that monster egg. Is there a human equivalent, I wonder :ohmy: (kind of wish I hadn't thought that...).
Yes, I had exactly the same thought. Ouch.
And sadly there is the same condition in humans. Exceptionally rare and it is often fatal. The condition is where a foetus grows inside another foetus when it should have been twins or more often a singlet. In the very early stages of pregnancy, after twins have occurred (which is amazingly common but then 1 usually dies at the you can still count the number of cells stage) one foetus will wrap itself around the cells of the other and enclose it. Usually the inside on dies insitu and no one is any the wiser, but just very occasionally the foetus will grow along with its sibling and become a parasitic host. More often than not it is simply a clump of hair and eye sockets with a malformed sound and a malformed brain, but just occasionally it is more, but never capable of independent life.

OK it is called fetus-in-fetu and there was a case of it earlier this year in China with a newly born girl being pregnant with her own twins! They were in fact triplets.
www.medicaldaily.com/medical-mysteries-chinese-baby-born-pregnant-twins-abdomen-due-fetus-fetu-condition-321568
The case I knew about was of a Kazakh boy being 'pregnant' with his own brother.

  • Alamjan Nematilaev was the surviving host of a fetus in fetu. In 2003, aged 7, his schoolphysician in Kazakhstan referred him to a hospital after movements were detected in the boy's enlarged abdomen. An operation intended to remove a cyst uncovered the fetus of Alamjan's identical twin brother, which had lived as a parasitic growth inside the boy throughout his entire life. The fetus was comparatively highly developed, with hair, arms, fingers, nails, legs, toes, genitals, a head, and a vague approximation of a face.[7]
 
I do think the sorting of eggs can remove the double yolkers for use the commercial market or specific packs,they X-ray them and scan then for cracks to all in a split second,so getting one is ,getting quite rare,but if you get free range eggs direct from the bird you will get more of a chance
 
Since that morning I went searching to see what more information I could find. I just can't seem to find what I thought was a record breaking six yolk egg. I was rushing so I don't know if I got it mixed up with the family who found six double yolks in one crate of eggs. I think it's been long enough that I had these eggs sitting around not knowing what to do with them. Clearly some are so familiar with it it's just another egg. When I found it I kept poking at the two small yolks to see if they looked infected or something. I have to say one looked a little troubled so I knew I was not going to use it.

Reading all this information has me a little uncomfortable about eating my next egg. I am waiting until the right time to tell my son. He's the kind that would tell me he wants no more if he reads all this. All this reading lead me to the egg with a tail found in China. :cook::sick::chicken:
 
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