Egg Sexing

[pichikeen]

Per Pliny the Elder in Naturalis Historia (c.79 AD):
"The rounder egge prooves to be the hen commonly, the rest will be cockes."

Have you found this to be true?

 

[speckledhen]

Absolutely false. It's an old wives tale. If that was true, hatcheries wouldn't have to kill thousands of cockerels every year.

 

[ole-crone]

The shape of the egg depends on the chicken. I have some that lay all round, others that lay almost cigar shaped.

Unfortunately it isn't true.

 

[WriterofWords]

Now that is neat, next time I put eggs in the bator I'm going to mark them according to that prediction and also by dowsing and I'm going to see if anything is even remotely close!

 

[poupoule]

So does anybody know how to sex 1 week old chicks?

 

[rooster-red]

Quote:
Nope, been there, done that, its a myth.

 

[luvmychix]

Quote:
I done this and put the rounded ones in one tray and the other in another tray and when they hatched i put each batch in different brooders and still came up with about a 50/50 in each.... sorry but Unfortunately it does not work. I wish it did but it don't.... Not with Quail anyway.

 

[Sunny Side Up]

Quote:
But it's so remarkable to think of someone studying chickens over nineteen hundred years ago,writing down his observations, and being able to read them today. What will chickens be like nineteen hundred years from now? Will anyone then be able to find the words we are writing about them today? What could Old Pliny have done if he had Internet access and BYC?

Maybe the chickens back then really did lay different shaped eggs depending on the sex of the chick within. But perhaps all our selective breeding has now produced chickens that lay eggs of a predictable, consistent shape.

Interesting things to think about...

Look at me, Pliny!

Look at me, Pliny!

 

[s6bee]

Quote:
Depending on the breed, there is a way to sex day old chicks doing a wing feather test. It's been so long since I did this I would do a google search and see. But I think that if you spread the wing out, a female would have a second row of longer feathers and the roo would have feathers equal in length. Don't quote me on that though.

 

[pichikeen]

Quote:
But it's so remarkable to think of someone studying chickens over nineteen hundred years ago,writing down his observations, and being able to read them today. What will chickens be like nineteen hundred years from now? Will anyone then be able to find the words we are writing about them today? What could Old Pliny have done if he had Internet access and BYC?

Maybe the chickens back then really did lay different shaped eggs depending on the sex of the chick within. But perhaps all our selective breeding has now produced chickens that lay eggs of a predictable, consistent shape.

Interesting things to think about...

Look at me, Pliny!

Look at me, Pliny!

This is what I was thinking exactly. The rest of the text is amazing to read...if only more were translated into English.

He also gave us the gem "Admire the big farm, but till the small".
Keen guy.