my first "lash egg" experience

[helenbk1966]

If any of my chickens lay something as freakish as these pics I will run screaming from the coop never to return! Holy crap! How can you people be so calm and cool? I would totally think a radioactive alien rooster had attacked my hens and left his demon seed behind!

 

[3chickchicks]

 

[kwhit]

Well, now I finally get to plant my pictures in this thread. These pictures are



what I found. I thought one of
my hens ate a piece of insulating foam, or worse I might have an egg eater, but now I wonder about this lash egg. Even my 'Raising
Chickens for Dummies' book did not mention this affliction. And because of our chicken community
forum, I feel a little better, but (1 out of 5) it is difficult to figure out who is doing it. The only thing I can possibly
do is go out at night with a flashlight and see who is sitting over it. It seems to be happening more and more
frequently, lately. My Hens (I had 6 but lost one to a hawk a couple of weeks ago, now I have 5) that I have are 2 rhode island reds,
and 3 black sex links. So the sex links are hybrid? I got them in March 2013 from a local feed store.
Maybe it's time to cull them. They aren't giving me any eggs at this point anyway. I wonder if I can butcher and eat them?
Will they be safe to eat with Lash Egg?

 

[Junibutt]

Well, now I finally get to plant my pictures in this thread. These pictures are



what I found. I thought one of
my hens ate a piece of insulating foam, or worse I might have an egg eater, but now I wonder about this lash egg. Even my 'Raising
Chickens for Dummies' book did not mention this affliction. And because of our chicken community
forum, I feel a little better, but (1 out of 5) it is difficult to figure out who is doing it. The only thing I can possibly
do is go out at night with a flashlight and see who is sitting over it. It seems to be happening more and more
frequently, lately. My Hens (I had 6 but lost one to a hawk a couple of weeks ago, now I have 5) that I have are 2 rhode island reds,
and 3 black sex links. So the sex links are hybrid? I got them in March 2013 from a local feed store.
Maybe it's time to cull them. They aren't giving me any eggs at this point anyway. I wonder if I can butcher and eat them?
Will they be safe to eat with Lash Egg?

My ISA Brown just laid something like that. She is 1 year and 11 months so I guess that seems to be a common problem with this hatchery brand egg laying machines. Yes I am calling her that because she only skipped 4 or 5 times since she started laying and then she had a frost bite about 4 weeks ago and she stopped laying. Today she laid a lash which could mean one of the 2 things. Maybe the shock of the frost bite froze stopped her from laying any eggs and the last one degenerated in her tubes and came out a month later like this and now she is ready to be normal. OR the reproductive organs/pathways have been damaged permanently now and its time for her to move on to the next world (if there is any). She is otherwise very healthy with no signs whatsoever. around her vent and abdomen.

 

[Noble Rooster]

My hybrids laid these crazy things too, and all but one died from egg yolk peritonitis. They made it to between 3 and 3.5 years old and each laid probably somewhere over 750 eggs in their lives (starting at 16 weeks!). I would dissect these lash eggs too to see what on earth they were but to me it always just looked like tissue, nothing as egg like as in the OP's photos. I too have sworn not to get hybrids again because of what they all went through at the end. Being engineered to be ovaries with feathers for our convenience has some horrible consequences. I'm sorry to hear about everyone's sweet birds. It is interesting that there isn't much about this out there in the chicken literature (that I could find, anyway) when it seems to be fairly common in the hybrids.

 

[kwhit]

I have a new friend I met at UCONN last week. I'm going to ask him what he knows.
He is a poultry science professor. Dr. Darre.

 

[snitker79]

I'm researching these myself this evening. Had a gal lay one today (hasn't laid an egg in about 3 weeks). Lost 2 girls, 1 a few weeks ago and 1 a year ago from what might have been this issue. But I'm just now learning of Lash Eggs due to Autumn laying one.

 

[kwhit]

There are a few people here and there that say it is hereditary? Some say
it is an "itis" of some sort. No one really knows. Some have never heard of lash egg.
Very puzzling.

 

[kathleens1979]

@Junibutt and @Kwhit, how did things turn out with your birds? I'm curious if you had to cull your poor ladies laying lash eggs. Hope they have recovered.

 

[Junibutt]

@Junibutt and @Kwhit, how did things turn out with your birds? I'm curious if you had to cull your poor ladies laying lash eggs. Hope they have recovered.

Mine is still alive thanks to my son who doesn't let me cull her. She does lay an egg once a week. One week it has a strong shell and the other week without a shell or so weak its broken by other hens accidentally. I tried to incubate 2 of her eggs but apparently they were so porous, everything evaporated from them within a week. So she will be a free-loader for the rest of her life with us. I wonder if she will survive next winter.