Poorest flocks of     Games and                 36 lbs.   19 1-5  20c. 
Southern Dunghills    Hamburgs.

Average Tennessee     Poorest strains           40 lbs.   21 1-3  22 1-3c.
or Texas eggs.        of Leghorns.

Average for the The mixed barnyard 43 lbs. 23 23 9-10c.  United States as fowl of the western represented by farm, largely of Kansas, Plymouth Rock origin.  Minnesota and Southern Illinois.

  Average size of eggs American Brahmas 48 lbs. 25 3-5 26 2-3c.
  produced in Denmark. and Minorcas.

  Selected brands of Equaled by several 54 lbs. 28 4-5 30c. 
  Danish eggs. pens of Leghorns in
                        the Australian laying
                        contest.

How Eggs Are Spoiled.

Dirty eggs are grouped roughly in three classes:  (A) Plain dirties, those to which soil or dung adheres; (B) stained eggs, those caused by contact with damp straw or other material which discolors the shell (plain dirties when washed usually show this appearance); (C) smeared eggs, those covered with the contents of broken eggs.

For the first two classes of dirty eggs the producer is to blame.  The third class originates all along the route from the nest to consumer.  The percentage of dirty eggs varies with the season and weather conditions, being noticeably increased during rainy weather.  In grading, about five per cent. of farm grown eggs are thrown out as dirties.  These dirties are sold at a loss of at least twenty per cent.

The common trade name for cracked eggs is checks.  Blind checks are those in which the break in the shell is not readily observable.  They are detected with the aid of the candle, or by sounding, which consists of clicking the eggs together.  Dents are checks in which the egg shell is pushed in without rupturing the membrane.  Leakers have lost part of the contents and are not only an entire loss themselves, but produce smeared eggs.

The loss from breakage varies considerably with the amount of handling in the process of marketing.  A western produce house, collecting from grocers by local freight will record from four to seven per cent. of checks.  With properly handled eggs the loss through breakage should not run over one or two per cent.

Eggs in which the chick has begun to develop are spoken of as “heated” eggs.  Infertile eggs cannot heat because the germ has not been fertilized and can make no growth.  That such infertile eggs cannot spoil is, however, a mistaken notion, for they are subjected to all the other factors by which

eggs may be spoiled.  The sale of eggs tested out of the incubators has been encouraged by the dissemination of the knowledge that infertile eggs are not changed by incubation.  Eggs thrown out of an incubator will be shrunken and weakened, and some of them may contain dead germs and the remains of chicks that have died after starting to develop.  Such eggs may be sold for what they are, but should never be mixed with other eggs or sold as fresh.  When carefully candled they should be worth ten or twelve cents a dozen.