Homegrown Neighbor here. My chicken Whitey, a.k.a. Chickenzilla, has been laying some wonderful eggs lately. Of course, she is a meat chicken, not a layer. I think of her as a “rescue” chicken. Most meat chickens are harvested between just 7 and 10 weeks of age. At over a year old now, Chickenzilla is likely one of the oldest broiler hens alive.  But she is a surprisingly good layer, with a big, bad-ass personality to match her immense body. When I first got her she only wanted to eat chicken kibble, which is mostly corn. When I let her out in the run she would just sit down and do nothing. She was a perfectly lazy broiler hen– a corporate agribusiness chicken. Eventually the other chickens showed her how good bugs and greens are and she started scratching around in the dirt and eating worms. Now she eats all her greens like a good girl. She has more kale and less corn in her diet these days. And she is very active. Despite her heft she can outrun all the other chickens when I throw a choice grub or beetle into their enclosure. She can even jump/fly the three feet into the compost bin to hunt for good eats. If Chickenzilla can leave her corn-fed agribusiness breeding behind and transform into a homegrown, vegetable loving, free range, compost enthusiast chicken then maybe there is hope for the American food system.

Andy Schneider, a.k.a. the “Chicken Whisperer”, explains that his Internet radio show is “fair and balanced” since, “chickens have both a right and left wing.” The Backyard Poultry show covers everything from bantams to the controversial National Animal Identification System. You can listen live on Sandy Springs Radio or download past shows here.

Thanks to Christine Heinrichs, author of How To Raise Chickens
and the Official Poultry Bookstore blog for tipping us off to the Chicken Whisperer. Heinrichs was a guest on the May 9th show.

Now maybe it’s time for Rush to start talkin’ turkey.

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?