Blood and White Stuff In Eggs

This blog is in answer to my Daughter-in-law's question about the things that she found inside her Grandmother's farm fresh eggs.

A chalaza is a white threadlike structure in an egg which helps to keep the yolk in place inside the shell, like an anchor. Sometimes, there are two of these visible on opposite sides, other times only one is visible. Over time this rope can get twisted as the yolk moves around inside the shell, making it look thick and bumpy.

The chalaza is perfectly safe to eat, although it can be removed if you wish. The more visible the chalaza is, the fresher the egg. This is why they are not very noticeable in store bought eggs. If you are reading this post without ever getting eggs fresh from the farm, you probably don't even know what I am talking about because you have never seen one.

Blood Spots or Meat Spots that are sometimes found in eggs are caused by ruptured blood vessels during the formation of the egg.

Candling methods can reveal blood spots in eggs, if you wish to go to the trouble. However, as the egg ages the yolk takes up water from the albumen and dilutes the blood spot making it vanish, so blood spots actually indicate that the egg is super fresh. Again, this is the main reason that these meat spots, like the chalaza are not normally found in store bought eggs. Eggs with these spots are perfectly fine to eat or the spot can be removed with the tip of a knife.

Finding chalaza or meat spots in your eggs do not reflect the quality of the eggs. They only tell you that your eggs are fresh. The color of the yolks are the real test of quality. The lighter the yolk the less nutritional value.

94 Degrees

I hope everyone had a nice Labor Day weekend. We spent Labor Day doing just that, laboring. We were in the hay fields on both Monday and Tuesday. Yesterday we got the full experience of hefting hay bales at 94º with no one to help us.

I drove and my Husband loaded and stacked the hay. He complains a lot more than he did when he was young but he still does an awesome job. I don't think there would be many young men who could have kept up with him over the last two days.

I did help him unload the trailers when we got back to the barn but he did all of the stacking in a tin barn with no shade over it and no air circulation, the dust was unbearable and the sunny 94º temperature outside felt cool compared to the temperature inside. He stacked all the way to the roof and does it so tightly that it is hard to get out to feed during the winter.

He has put up hay all of his life, when we were first married, we had our own hay crew and put up hay for all of the neighboring farms before the big round balers were invented. He has little patience with sloppy stacked hay. We who have helped him in the barn, have always said that when he gets done stacking hay, you can roller skate on top of it.

The hay is finished for the year and boy am I happy about that. We may pick up a few more bales throughout the fall and winter but there will be no more hot fields and hot barns to deal with. Maybe life will return to a more normal pace and I can get some things done and blog more.

Staying Alert

Our Department of Farmland Security Terror Alert has been raised here with the addition of 15 new chickens. The Fox could not resist coming in closer yesterday to look over the new arrivals. My Husband was outside and heard one of the new hens complaining bitterly, so he looked for the source of her irritation and saw the fox licking his lips nearby. By the time the DH got into the house for a weapon, the fox had disappeared.

So I have my marching orders for today, I am to keep a sharp eye out for the intruder. I have already walked the perimeter twice this morning with my new scoped Savage .17 H.M.R. that I have not even shot yet.

I will have to do some research before I am able to say for sure what kind of chickens these all are but they are a colorful bunch. One that I think is a red sexlink is already a favorite of mine, she follows me around everywhere I go. As soon as I have time I will post pictures of them and maybe someone can help me out on what they are.

Good Help

The rest of the hay wagons are being unloaded and put in the loft while I am typing this. Thankfully I am not having to participate because we have three able bodied, strong, young men here to take my place. They don't have as much experience as I have but my DH will manage somehow without me.

Way back when we were young, we put together a hay crew and put up hay for our neighbors in a large farming community. This was before the large round balers were invented, everyone square baled. I cringe to think about how much hay we put up each summer. We went through several high school age boys back then, they had to be tough to keep up the pace that my Husband set.

We were running several head of cattle and horses back then also, we had a large old barn that we would fill full of hay every year and had hay to sell all winter. The hay that we put up yearly now couldn't hold a candle to the amount of hay that we put up then.

Our loft will be full after today, then we will have to fill our friend's barn, she has room for about 300 bales. After that we will have to buy round bales because we will be out of storage space. My DH says that we will be paying about $4200 for hay this year.

I am going to attempt to go riding soon, I have finally talked my Husband into letting me try. I really want to ride again. I know I will have to brace up my back and I will have to break myself into it slowly but my dream is to be able to trail ride again. My Doctor says, no, but what does he know, he is only practicing anyway.

The Rock

One thing that we are blessed with on our farm is limestone, not a great thing to have on a farm but they can sometimes be useful. We have many nice rock specimens, in many different shapes and sizes. My Son chose one after I had griped about wanting a large rock for my goats to play on. His Dad and he loaded it into the bucket of our new tractor (putting the first scratch on it before the first payment was made) and delivered it to the goat lot.

The goats were somewhat scared of it to begin with but it didn't take long for them to warm up to it. Goats love to climb, play king of the hill and jump off of high places, so this is perfect goat decor.

Within one day my goats had accepted the rock as their favorite spot in the lot. They stand on it, fight over it, sleep around it and have general community meetings there. It is also very good for little goat hooves, keeping them worn down, neat and trim.

I have already told my Son and Husband that the goat lot needs a couple more large rocks to complement this one and add to the overall ambiance.

Giselle

After working with Giselle for many hours and trying everything that we could think of, she continued to go downhill rapidly. I found a scalpel and gathered my towels, so that we would be ready when she breathed her last breath to open her up and try to save her babies.

She died in my arms and my DH went to work as quickly as possible. He had no problem locating the first kid and handing it to me. I immediately gave it a gentle swing to try to clear it's lungs and passageways, and started toweling it off but put it down when I got no response and took the next one, the same thing happened. He handed me the third one and quickly searched for more before turning to help me.

We worked and worked, slinging, thumping, rubbing, even giving some mouth to mouth but none of them ever moved or responded in any way. A black buck, a black and white spotted buck and a mahogany spotted doe.

This turned out to be a bad Easter for me, my new Easter dress went unworn and I am wondering if there was something more that I could have done for Giselle or for the babies. My Dear Husband says that this is just life on the farm. You are always going to lose a few battles, I suppose. But it still really hurts...