More nutritious eggs?

[Morgaine]

I was on the Mt. Healthy site and they say Araucana eggs are reportable more nutritious. Is that true?

Here is what they say, I'm copying and pasting.

Araucanas
Originally from Chili, in South America they are called the Easter egg fowl. They lay colored eggs: blue, green, pink, and olive drab. These birds vary in size and color, some may have whiskers and others muffs of feathers that cover their ears. Their eggs are reported to have more nutritional value than ordinary eggs.​

 

[ibpboo]

I have heard of this too, not sure of how true it is.

 

[luvmychicknkids]

I know that of all my eggs, the ones from my EE are the darkest and richest. Since EE's are a mutt variety descendant of Araucanas, I assume it is true.

 

[patandchickens]

It's an urban myth that's been rattling around for a couple of decades. Green or blue eggs are actually the same in nutrient composition as any other color egg. What matters is what the hen has been eating.

(That is probably where the rumor got startted -- if you compare the nutrients in a homegrown araucana or EE egg, from a hen fed lots of plants or freeranging, it *will* generally have higher omega-whatever and lower cholesterol and so forth than a grocery store egg from a battery-farm hen fed only layer mash).

I don't have the time to search for it right now, sorry, but you will find links to good Mother Earth News articles on this subject in a buncha other places on this forum, with actual numbers and so forth to refer to.

HTH,

Pat

 

[speckledhen]

Pat is correct. There have been studies that even show a slightly higher cholesterol level than other eggs, but not sure how scientific those were, can't site them at the moment. I believe it's safe to say that the nutritional value of eggs is relative to how the chickens are raised, not the breed or color of the egg.

 

[bluerose]

From a news report about farmed vs pastured eggs:

In 1974, the British Journal of Nutrition found that pastured eggs had 50 percent more folic acid and 70 percent more vitamin B12 than eggs from factory farm hens.

In 1988, Artemis Simopoulos, co-author of The Omega Diet, found pastured eggs in Greece contained 13 times more omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids than U.S. commercial eggs.

A 1998 study in Animal Feed Science and Technology found that pastured eggs had higher omega-3s and vitamin E than eggs from caged hens.

A 1999 study by Barb Gorski at Pennsylvania State University found that eggs from pastured birds had 10 percent less fat, 34 percent less cholesterol, 40 percent more vitamin A, and four times the omega-3s compared to the standard USDA data. Her study also tested pastured chicken meat, and found it to have 21 percent less fat, 30 percent less saturated fat and 50 percent more vitamin A than the USDA standard.

In 2003, Heather Karsten at Pennsylvania State University compared eggs from two groups of Hy-Line variety hens, with one kept in standard crowded factory farm conditions and the other on mixed grass and legume pasture. The eggs had similar levels of fat and cholesterol, but the pastured eggs had three times more omega-3s, 220 percent more vitamin E and 62 percent more vitamin A than eggs from caged hens.

The 2005 study Mother Earth News conducted of four heritage-breed pastured flocks in Kansas found that pastured eggs had roughly half the cholesterol, 50 percent more vitamin E, and three times more beta carotene.



So yup... looks like it's diet regardless of breed.

 

[CoyoteMagic]

Yup what they said!

Just crack open a store bought egg and then one of your straight from the nest eggs and see which one looks healthier to you. My yoks are bright orange. Strange when I first saw them. They were on regular layers pellets milled somewhere around here. (they are on Layena now and even oranger!) Fry up both and do a blind taste test. Better yet get your kids to do it! You'll know which one is the better egg

 

[Morgaine]

Thank everyone. I actually have the MEN(MOther Earth News) Magazine where they compared their free ranged eggs to those in the super market. In fact it's one of the things that really made me want my own chickens.

I thought I had read everywhere that eggs where the same for all breeds, that diet mattered most. I just thought it odd that it was on a hatchery site.

 

[luvmychicknkids]

Despite what everyone is saying, my EE's eggs ARE significantly darker than my other hens. All are dark...far darker yellow than a store egg. However, you crack one of hers next to any other of my hens eggs and you can easily pick hers. She eats the same food, wanders the same yard.......

I am sure there is some reason they think this. The nutrition content may not be different but the color and the flavor are definitely richer.

 

[Reinbeau]

Here is the link to the Mother Earth News test results.