Los Angeles Chicken Produces World’s Largest Egg


Well, I exaggerate a bit. Neighbor Lora Hall rushed over this afternoon to show us an egg as big as the Dodger Stadium parking lot produced by her hefty Cornish Cross hen who goes by the name “Chickenzilla”. It was the same day that we found a tiny shell-less egg in our chicken coop. For your amusement we’ve lined up a set of freakish and normal eggs above. From left to right, a banty egg, one of our Plymouth Rock’s eggs, Chickenzilla’s big-ass egg and, on the ruler, the shell free egg.

Chickens have been bred to be egg laying machines. Occasionally an egg will emerge before it’s time and you get an egg without a shell. Conversely some eggs will stay in longer and get big. You also get oddly shaped eggs on occasion. It’s perfectly normal if these freak eggs happen once in a while. If you get a lot of strange eggs it may be a sign of disease or nutritional deficiencies.

Hall’s Cornish Cross chicken, incidentally, is a meat chicken that is not meant to live beyond a few weeks. Chickenzilla is remarkably healthy for a year old Cornish. They are bred to put on weight quickly and often can’t support their own weight should they somehow skip the butcher’s block. Permaculturist Harvey Ussery has a nice article in Backyard Poultry magazine on alternatives to the Cornish Cross if you’re interested in keeping meat chickens (or interested in knowing where your meat comes from as Cornish Cross chickens are what you get at the supermarket). Meanwhile Chickenzilla is happily living out her years and producing eggs the size of the national debt. Stimulus omelet anyone?

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3 Comments

  1. ahh thanks for this post. tell Lora I said hi. I’ve got to find out what type of chicken I have that I found nesting in my backyard.

  2. How did she manage to get that meat chicken to live? Can she guest post with pictures? I’d really like to know about Chickenzilla and her laying and life.

    If she is a healthy and longer lived CC then she might be a GREAT mother of a stronger line that won’t all die of coronaries if they miss a chopping block by a day, yes?

  3. Mrs. Homestead dropping in to comment here.

    First, the chicken’s proper name is Peckerella, not Chickenzilla, as Erik reported–though it is possible she may occasionally be called Chickenzilla. Just wanted to set the record straight.

    @ChristyACB: That’s a good idea. We’ll ask Lora if she’ll send some pics.

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