very strange egg - any ideas?

[sjmjrgkmg]

Today when I walked into my coop there was an awful smell, and there among the "normal" eggs, I found the source. One of my hens laid what I suppose could be called an egg, only it was more than twice the size of a large egg (goose egg-sized), covered only with a tough membrane - no shell - and contained a really noxious mixture of opaque, light yellow fluid (think runny banana pudding) and bits that looked like cooked egg white. Believe me, I didn't get too close, but when I broke it apart with my shovel on the compost pile, that's what it looked like. I do know that this egg was not fertilized (urban chickens = no roosters), all my hens are acting fine, and I'm reasonably sure that this egg was laid today because I recently did a fairly thorough scoop out of litter and there were no old eggs buried in the wood shavings. Any ideas? Anyone else have this kind of strange egg from time to time? We've had our share, but nothing that was this odd, and came out of the hen already stinky.

Sue

 

[poipollo]

I've had that happen twice (same hen both times)! Not sure why it happens. The hen was fine though and returned to laying regular eggs the next day.