V-Flyer

Have 6 double yolks in one half dozen box of eggs?

I really couldn't believe it, the first one was a double & then the second & I thought 'wow!'.

As we had house guests with us I called out to them that I'd got 2 double yolks as I was cracking the third egg & it was a double too. By this time they'd had to come & have a look. I cracked the next & then the next & we were taking bets by this time on whether the final egg would be a double & it was.

What are the odds on the happening?

I was making scrambled eggs to go with smoked salmon & it was yummy.

R-P

Not the first I'm afraid.

We have had this but quite some time ago.

We know our supplier quite well and asked about it - it seems that it happens when hens get old. Our local farm does not retire their hens - they live out their lives around the farm (all properly free range)

I've never had any from a supermarket but many moons ago we used to buy all our eggs from a farm nearby to my grandparents. We were always offered "double yolkers" and generally accepted.We can still get them in the local farmers market occasionally too.

Bummer!!

I got all over excited.

Our eggs do come from a local small holding.

I even took a photo (of the eggs in the pan, not the chickens).

R-P

Aw, sorry to burst your bubble, I had a box a few years ago too.
They can shine a light through the eggs and see the double yokers... but it's still nice!

Bill S wrote:Not the first I'm afraid.

We have had this but quite some time ago.

We know our supplier quite well and asked about it - it seems that it happens when hens get old. Our local farm does not retire their hens - they live out their lives around the farm (all properly free range)

Yep ... just one of those things that you might think is random, & so has an outside odds situation, but in fact ends up being causally connected. Once you've found one, the chance of finding another goes up dramatically ...

MarkedMan wrote:Yep ... just one of those things that you might think is random, & so has an outside odds situation, but in fact ends up being causally connected. Once you've found one, the chance of finding another goes up dramatically ...

Just like Brussels Airlines Flaps ....

I can't remember the last time I had 1 double yolk egg, let alone 6! I must change where I get them from!!

I can beat it -
10 out of 10 in a box of Skea Big 10 XL eggs about 6 weeks ago.

DocRo wrote:I can beat it -
10 out of 10 in a box of Skea Big 10 XL eggs about 6 weeks ago.

Must be lots of old hens in Dungannon

Am delighted that so many V-Flyers buy local and free range.

Huge .

In days of yore (well, actually only a few years ago) it was possible to buy so-marked boxes of double yolkers in Waitrose.

Am a tad deflated now but happy that folks buy free range (= still with the s**t on them ).

I'll go away now & try to be the first to do something else.

R-P

Double yolkers are quite common. Its the end result of a malfunction in the hens laying system, the creation of the egg is hormone dependent and done in stages over the course of a day but young pullets that have recently come into lay often produce double yolkers as their systems adjust to the timing. Flocks of commercial hens are usually the same age so its not unusual to get a large number of double yolkers from a flock, and the odd hen will just carry on laying that way if her system doesn't correct itself.

Our ex-batts only lay single yolks, although one hen laid a 'double egg' a while ago which was basically twice the size of a normal egg with two yolks. I have found that events like bad weather and gales or heavy rainstorms can 'upset' the hens which affects their egg production. We also have one poor hen who has a 'knackered' shell gland from the effects of being in the battery system and she only lays soft shelled eggs.

Thanks for that Highflyer,

I think I'll have sausages in future

R-P

I can remember one of our hens when I was a kid laying a triple yolker. Mind you, like Highflyer's double yolker, the egg was extra large and my aunt determined that the hen had been eggbound and a couple of the eggs had fused

I used to buy the double yolks box in M&S, havent seen them for a while now tho.