Ahhhhh……What Is That Red Spot in My Egg?

Is it safe to eat?

Recently, a customer found a red spot in one of our eggs.  This concerned her a bit as she didn’t know what it was.  These spots, sometimes called “meat spots” or “blood spots,” are no cause for concern (thank goodness for her).  It is just one of the unusual things that you might find with eggs from your local farmer right alongside variations in shell color and egg size.  Factory eggs are candled and inspected to ensure uniformity and “defects” that might deter the consumer from purchasing them.

But what exactly are they?

Contrary to popular belief (and I was guilty of this as well), it is not a fertilized egg.  According to the Egg Safety Center, “Meat spots or blood spots are caused by the rupture of a blood vessel on the yolk surface when it’s being formed or by a similar accident in the wall of the oviduct…  Eggs with blood spots and meat spots are fit to eat.”

A couple of frequently asked questions:

1. Why do blood spots occur?

According to the CountrySide website, there are several reasons that this can occur

• Genetic;
• Caused by lighting the coop through the winter; exposing the chicken to excess light and not give her enough time in darkness to produce adequate melatonin or by excess levels of Vitamin A and K in the hen’s diet;
• Fungus toxins in the feed;
• Or Avian encephalomyelitis, both of these are rare.

2. Do I candle our eggs?

Yes, I candle them but only when I am incubating them to see if they are fertile.  I don’t do it when I am selling the eggs because it is just not necessary.  And since it is not harmful to have a blood spot, I don’t take the time to candle each and every egg.  Nor, is the taste of the egg changed.

All in all, not a big deal finding a blood spot in your eggs. Chickens aren’t perfect and their bodies will make mistakes.  After all, the process of producing an egg is complex and when a chicken can produce an egg every 26 hours, there is bound to be a mistake (or anomaly) once in a while.  It can happen two to four percent of the time [1].  It doesn’t necessarily mean that the chicken is unhealthy.  That is why I encourage people to get to know the farmer from whom you buy your eggs.  Talk to them, ask them what they feed, how the chickens are housed, and ask to visit the farm so you can see for yourself.  You can tell the health of the chicken by the looking at the yolk, but that is a post for another time.  So, stay tuned for that one.

Do you have any other concerns about purchasing local eggs?  Tell me about them.

Sources:

https://countrysidenetwork.com/daily/poultry/eggs-meat/what-does-blood-in-chicken-eggs-mean/