Can contents of layed eggs be impacted by worms?

scChickn

Hatching
11 Years
Mar 11, 2008
9
0
7
Here's the situation. My friend is a vet, on they way home I gave her a dozen eggs. She called back later and said my chickens have worms. She based this on what she saw in the eggs I gave her. She seemed to think that the fact that some of the eggs had spots in them indicated the chickens have worms.

I didn't think the contents of eggs would be affected by the chicken having worms or not. But maybe I'm wrong?

Anyway, my 10 chickens lay 7-8 eggs a day. I've been breaking a few and really inspecting them closely, and some do have spots in them. I just assumed these are what people call "blood spots" when they are red, or sometimes "meat spots" when they are brownish, which I guess is still blood. Not all the eggs have them, but some do have a few specks.

I thought this was normal.

Is it possible my vet friend is right, and my chickens have worms?
 
I am no expert on chickens - but have you noticed any worms in thier poop? I would imagine if they had worms you would see something in the poop piles.
hopefully someone with more knowledge will help you out.


Julie
 
To answer both the previous questions:

No, I haven't seen anything in the poop. I did notice that some is looser than others, but the color seems good.

No the vet does not specialize in avian, I believe she is a "large animal" vet. Which means she's on farms, but may not know much about birds...
 
I've heard that if your hens have a very heavy worm load, you can actually find some inside the shell. Happily I have never seen such a thing! Eeek!
The only way I know of to check is a fecal sample - have your vet check a poo sample.
 
I am assuming by heavy worm load, you'd mean that any visual inspection of droppings would show visible worms of some kind. And if found in an egg, or poop, what would these worms look like? Are some worms too small to see?
 
My guess is that they are meat spots that regularly end up in eggs. I think there is a type of worm that can present in eggs but only if badly infected. A fecal test can determine this for sure if they have worms and of what type. I'd have to say any free range chicken will have some worms, but often it is not a problem unless the worms overwhelm the chickens body. It's a question of how much rather than yes or no.
 
I'm thinking that if you are seeing eggs with worms on the inside, you would have other signs of a heavy infestation in your flock - ie worms in the stool, dull feathers, listless or lethargic birds, general low health.

I think your friend has never seen blood or meat spots in eggs before.
 

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