Hi! I'm new to BYC. We have been blessed with a rooster and chicken who wandered into our yard. The chicken has laid a few eggs in the garden and she leaves them during the day to wander the neighborhood. Can we eat these freshly laid eggs? What does it mean if she is leaving them? Is it safe? How long can they stay there? wendy & chad
If you collect them daily, put them in the fridge and eat them. If she has a nest and she's setting on the eggs and only leaves for a short time, I'd say she's broody and setting on fertilized eggs and would not eat them. Specially if you don't know how old the eggs are.
OK- thank you! she laid one yesterday morning - it was her first. then another this morning. she is not sitting on them during the days, just an hour or so in the mornings. I just wonder if it's ok to take them inside if they've been sitting outside for a day or so.
Yes you can eat them. I have went away over night before and didn't get home till the nest day, so the eggs sat in the nest boxes for two days. I ate them. They were good. Actually you can keep eggs for days unrefrigerated as long as you don't wash them and wash the bloom off them which is a natural coating the hens/pullets put on the egg shells when the lay them. It keeps bacteria from getting into the egg, a natural antibacterial coating. When the eggs are first layed they are wet but within a couple of minutes the eggs dry. Once you wash the eggs they must be refrigerated right away.
You can eat them. I love having fresh chicken eggs. We've never had to buy another egg from the day they started laying, and we've only got two chickens. Some of my eggs have been in the fridge over a week. They are still perfectly edible! Do NOT go into Online Poultry Show. Once you start you can't stop.
