Eggs 9781422227411, 1422227413, 9781422227442, 1422227448, 9781422290767, 142229076X

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NHMC13_8HBK_FeedngWorld_NHMC13_8HBK_FeedngWorld 4/27/13 2:04 PM Page 6

People all over the world eat eggs, mostly from chickens. Learn about the history of eating eggs and how we get our eggs today. Follow eggs as they make their way from chickens . . . to packing machines . . . to the grocery store . . . and finally to you! Discover the story of your food—where it was grown, who grows it, and how it gets to your plate.

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ISBN 978-1-4222-2744-2

EAN

90000

9 781422 227442 Cover images: Shutterstock.com

Feeding the World

Eggs

Feeding the World Corn Dairy Products Eggs Farmed Fish meat rice soybeans wheat

Feeding the World

Eggs Kim Etingoff

Mason Crest

Mason Crest 450 Parkway Drive, Suite D Broomall, PA  19008 www.masoncrest.com

Copyright © 2014 by Mason Crest, an imprint of National Highlights, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the publisher. Printed and bound in the United States of America. First printing 987654321 Series ISBN: 978-1-4222-2741-1 ISBN: 978-1-4222-2744-2 ebook ISBN: 978-1-4222-9076-7 The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcopy format(s) as follows: Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Etingoff, Kim. Eggs / Kim Etingoff. p. cm. — (Feeding the world) ISBN 978-1-4222-2744-2 (hardcover) — ISBN 978-1-4222-2741-1 (series) — ISBN 978-1-4222-9076-7 (ebook) 1. Eggs—Juvenile literature. 2. Food supply—Juvenile literature. I. Title. II. Series: Feeding the world. SF490.3.E85 2014 637’.5—dc23 2013004738 Publisher’s notes: The websites mentioned in this book were active at the time of publication. The publisher is not responsible for websites that have changed their addresses or discontinued operation since the date of publication. The publisher will review and update the website addresses each time the book is reprinted.

Contents 1. Where Do Eggs Come From? 7 2. The History of Eggs 13 3. Who Raises the Chickens That Lay Eggs? 21 4. How Are Eggs Produced? 27 5. How Do Eggs Get to Your Plate? 37 Words to Know 45 Find Out More 46 Index 47 About the Author & Picture Credits 48

Chapter One

Where Do Eggs Come From?

I

magine that you’re walking up and down the aisles of your local grocery store. You walk past the fresh fruits and vegetables. You pass the snack food. You arrive at the milk and egg part of the store. Have you ever thought about where all that food comes from? You might say, “Yogurt comes from a container.” Or, “Juice comes from a bottle.” What about before that? Food doesn’t just show up at home or in a grocery store by magic. It has to come from somewhere!

The Beginning All food comes from the earth. Fruits and vegetables grow in the ground. They are plants. Farmers grow them. Grains grow in the ground too. Grains are foods like rice, wheat, and oats. We make them into bread, oatmeal, and pasta. Farmers grow grain.

Meat, milk, and eggs come from animals. Farmers raise cows, chickens, pigs, goats, and other animals. They milk animals like cows and goats. They also collect eggs from chickens. Cereal and juice don’t grow in the ground. But the ingredients in them do. Cereal is made from wheat and corn. Farmers grow both. Juice is made from fruit. It also has sugar in it, which we get from plants called sugarcane or sugar beets. Farmers grow those plants before they’re turned into the sugar that goes into juice, cookies, and many other things. Processed foods are harder to figure out. Processed foods are made in factories. Someone has to put a bunch of ingredients together to make a processed food. Processed foods include chips and other snack foods. Frozen meals, cereal, and bread are all processed foods. Juice and soda are processed drinks. There are lots and lots of processed foods in the world.

Food Stories Every food has a story. It starts out somewhere on a farm. Then it usually goes to a factory. After that, it travels to grocery stores. Finally, that food ends up in your home. But not all food has the same story. We can tell different stories, based on where our food comes from. Some food is local . That means it was grown near where you live. Let’s think about an orange’s story. If an orange is local, it was grown close to you. A farmer in the same town as you grew that orange. You can buy local food right from the farmer. You could go to the farm and pick some oranges or buy some from a store on the farm. Or you could buy oranges at a local farmers’ market. Farmers’ markets are places where local farmers can sell what they grow right to the people who want to eat the food. There isn’t a grocery store between farmers and people eating the food they grow. You could also grow your own oranges. Picking oranges from your own orange tree is as local as you can get! Oranges don’t grow everywhere. They grow in hot places. You have to live in a place where oranges grow to get a local orange. Maybe you live somewhere that gets cold. Oranges don’t grow near you. But they might grow in other parts of your country. They might grow 300 miles away, where it’s warmer. If an orange comes from the other side of your country, that orange isn’t local. It’s still from your region, though. We call that regional food. Regional food doesn’t come from the other side of the world. But it doesn’t come from next door either.

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Every food you eat has a story about how it got to you. Like many other foods, oranges started on farms. The farm your oranges grew on might be near you or far away. Many people had to work hard to make sure you could eat oranges!

You can probably buy a regional orange from the grocery store. Orange farmers from 300 miles away have to send their oranges to the store near you. You wouldn’t want to drive all that way for an orange! Some countries don’t grow oranges. The whole country is too cold. But people still want to eat oranges there. Stores in the country have to bring in oranges from other, hotter places. They could come from Spain. Maybe the oranges you eat come from Florida in the United States. Or Brazil. If you don’t live in the country where your orange grew, you’re eating international food. International food comes from outside your country. We eat food from all over the world. The next time you go to the store, take a look at the labels on your food. They might say where it came from. If it doesn’t, ask someone at the store.

Where Do Eggs Come From?

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All eggs come from animals. Mostly, we eat chicken eggs. The chickens that lay the eggs we eat have to be raised on a farm. The story of the eggs you eat starts on a chicken farm.

10 Eggs

Eggs Do you ever eat eggs? You could eat them hard-boiled. You could eat them scrambled. You could eat them fried. Or you could eat them in other things, like cookies and cakes. Almost all the eggs we eat come from the same place—chickens! Chickens lay eggs. Female chickens, called hens, can lay eggs just about every day. Of course, the grocery store doesn’t have its own chickens. The chickens live somewhere else. They live on farms. That’s where farmers come in. Farmers raise chickens. They feed them and give them a place to live. They buy chicks and raise them to be adult chickens. The farmers collect the eggs that their chickens lay. They wash the eggs. Then they put them into packages. Then the eggs get sent to the grocery store. Finally, people like you and your family come to the grocery store. They buy the eggs and take them home to eat.

Chickens at Home Sometimes the trip an egg takes from the chicken to you is short. It can be even shorter if you raise your own chickens. Plenty of people have chickens right in their backyard! In more rural places, it’s easy to keep a few chickens. Even some towns and cities let you keep chickens. Then you can collect the eggs they lay every day. Chickens are pretty easy to take care of. And they give you food. Chickens need a place to live, some space, food, and water. Check to see if it’s okay to raise chickens where you live. And make sure to ask your parents before bringing a chicken home!

Where Do Eggs Come From?

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C h a p t e r Tw o

The History of Eggs

P

eople around the world eat eggs. And they’ve been eating eggs for a very long time. In fact, no one even knows when people first started eating eggs. It was a very long time ago. Today, the ways we farm and eat eggs are very different from the way they were farmed and eaten thousands of years ago.

Eggs in the Past The first eggs people ate were laid by wild birds. They weren’t from chickens. Somehow, people figured out they could eat eggs. The first person to eat an egg thought it was tasty. And it didn’t make that person sick. It was food! People learned to take eggs out of birds’ nests. Those birds laid even more eggs. The egg collectors saw that the birds would just keep laying eggs as long as people took them out of the nest. That still happens with chickens today. If you keep taking their eggs, they lay more.

Have you ever painted eggs for Easter? Colored eggs have become a big part of the springtime holiday. Today, people paint their own eggs or buy eggs made of plastic.

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Non-Bird Eggs Other animals lay eggs too. Reptiles, bugs, and fish lay eggs. And people have eaten some of those eggs. Reptiles, like turtles and alligators, lay eggs that some poeple eat. So do fish. Have you ever heard of caviar? Caviar is tiny fish eggs!

After that, people ate all sorts of eggs. The Chinese ate pigeon eggs. The Phoenicians in the Mediterranean ate ostrich eggs. People ate turkey eggs, duck eggs, goose eggs, and more. It depended on what kind of birds were around. There are many reasons why eggs made good food. First, they have a lot of protein in them. Protein helped ancient people survive and get strong. Meat is another source of protein. When hunting meat was too hard, people could eat eggs for their protein. Eggs were also easy to find. You just had to know where a bird’s nest was. You didn’t have to hunt. It wasn’t very dangerous. You just needed to be able to climb to the nest. In India, people ate red junglefowl eggs. Red junglefowl were wild birds. They were a lot like chickens. They are still around today. People still eat them and use them for eggs.

Easter Eggs Eggs have always had a big place in springtime festivals, like Easter. Chickens used to only lay eggs in the spring and summer. As soon as chickens started laying eggs, people knew that spring was coming. Early people dyed eggs with color. They ate them for the first time since the last year. Eggs were a celebration of spring! Later, eggs became part of Easter. People ate lots of eggs to celebrate Easter. Artists painted them in bright colors. Today, eggs are still a big part of Easter. Lots of kids like to dye eggs and then eat them. Plastic eggs with prizes or candy inside are a normal part of Easter in some places. Egg hunts are lots of fun!

The History of Eggs

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There are many different kinds of egg farms today. Some are big and have many chickens living on them. Others are small. On small farms, farmers only get a few eggs. They might only raise enough chickens to feed their family eggs.

We think that by 7000 bce, people were eating chicken eggs. Farmers in China and India kept chickens on farms. They didn’t have to go searching for wild bird eggs. At first, people just ate raw eggs. They didn’t have fire yet. That’s how long people have been eating eggs! Once people learned to use fire, they could cook their eggs. And once people started making clay pots, they could boil their eggs in water. Later, people started baking with eggs. People came up with new recipes that used eggs.

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Farming has changed a lot over the years. In the past, farmers might have raised just a few chickens. Today, farms raise hundreds or thousands of chickens in cages like these.

Eggs Today Chicken farms have changed a lot. A long time ago, all chicken farms were small. Families raised just a few chickens for themselves. If there were extra eggs, the farmers could sell them to families that didn’t have chickens.

The History of Eggs

17

All the eggs in the supermarket came from the farm to a factory. In the factory, eggs are washed and packed into cartons like these. Most eggs are packed by machines.

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Selling eggs made the farmers money. Some farmers decided they would sell more eggs to make more money. It made sense to get more chickens. Many farmers now had a few hundred chickens. The chickens lived outside on the farm. The farmer collected the eggs and sold them to stores. Some farmers wanted to sell even more eggs. They wanted to have thousands of chickens. They needed bigger farms and more farm workers. Big chicken farmers ended up moving their birds inside. It was cheaper and easier to raise chickens in cages inside. Outside, it was hard to keep track of all the chickens. And they could get eaten by other animals. Inside, farmers could raise more chickens. And the chickens they raised laid more eggs. Chicken farms got bigger and bigger. Over time, farms became more like factories. Chickens laid their eggs, and those eggs were washed and packed by machines. After all that, egg farms became even bigger. Thousands of chickens lived in one place. There are even flocks of more than a million chickens on a few farms.

People Disagree About Raising Chickens Not everyone agrees with how egg-laying chickens are treated. Today, many chickens are raised in factories rather than farms. Most chickens don’t have much room to move around. They can’t go outside. They don’t really get to live normal lives. Almost every egg you find at the store comes from these sorts of places. People who don’t like that choose to buy different eggs. They buy eggs right from a farmer they know. Or they look for a label on the egg carton that says the chickens were raised on a farm outside. Or they might even raise their own chickens!

The History of Eggs

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Chapter Three

W

Who Raises the Chickens That Lay Eggs? henever you buy a carton of eggs, you’re buying the work of a lot of people. You’re also buying the work of lots of chickens!

The Chicken Chickens naturally lay eggs. Eggs can hatch into new chickens if they’ve been fertilized by a rooster. But not all eggs are fertilized. If there isn’t a rooster around, chickens will still lay eggs. The eggs just won’t hatch into chicks. Chickens lay eggs every day or so. A new egg grows inside of a female chicken (a hen). When it gets big enough, the hen has to lay it. Then the hen can lay a new egg. Every hen lays about 300 eggs every year. That’s almost one a day. Altogether, a hen lays about 900 eggs during her lifetime. The farmer can get a lot of eggs!

Very small farms have little chicken coops like this one. A chicken coop is a place for chickens to live on a farm. On bigger farms, hundreds or even thousands of chickens live together in large buildings.

Chicken Breeds Chickens come in all sorts of breeds, or kinds. Each breed is a little different. Some get fatter and are good for meat. Some are good at living outside in the winter. Others are better at laying eggs. The Easter Egger, for example, lays eggs that are all different colors— pink, blue, and even purple!

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Inside these cages, chickens can eat and drink water. Chickens don’t have much room in the cages, but these cages make it easier to farm many eggs at once.

The Farmer Nobody would get the eggs that chickens lay without the farmer. She takes care of the chickens. The farmer also might be in charge of how the eggs get to customers . Some farmers have very small farms. They have a few chickens, to lay enough eggs for their families.They might also have a vegetable garden and other animals. The chickens on really small farms probably live outside. They have a chicken coop and can eat bugs and other things on the ground outside. Some chickens live inside a place with a fence around it. Others can walk all over the farm.

Who Raises the Chickens?

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Eggs are grown and eaten in countries around the world. These eggs are being sold in China. More eggs are grown in China than any other country in the world.

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Farmers with bigger farms could have a few hundred chickens. They only raise chickens for eggs. They might sell at local farmers’ markets, or to local grocery stores. At these farms, the chickens could live inside or outside. It’s up to the farmer. Some farmers have huge farms. They have hundreds of thousands of chickens. They produce millions of eggs every year. Lots of farmers work at each one of these farms. Machines also do a lot of the work at big farms. Farms like this sell eggs to big grocery stores. They might sell them to people in another country too. These bigger farms look very different than small farms.

Countries There are people who eat eggs in pretty much every country around the world. However, some countries produce a lot more eggs than others. All over the world, farmers raise more than 6 billion hens to lay eggs. Together, all those hens lay billions of eggs each year. That’s a lot of eggs! Half of all the eggs in the world come from just five countries. Many eggs come from China. A lot of chickens are laying a lot of eggs in China. The United States produces the next largest number of eggs. Then India. Then Japan. Mexico is the fifth-biggest producer of eggs. A lot of these countries send eggs to other countries. Other countries produce eggs too, but they have fewer chickens. Those chickens lay fewer eggs. Most of those countries produce eggs just for the people in that country.

Who Raises the Chickens?

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C h a p t e r F OUR

How Are Eggs Produced?

T

he chicken and the farmer are both important. Without both of them, you and your family wouldn’t have any eggs. The first step is chickens laying the eggs. But how do you get healthy chickens that lay healthy eggs? Farmers have to know a lot about chickens. They have to know how to raise chicks to become adult chickens. They have to know what chickens need to eat. They have to know what to do if their chickens get sick. Otherwise, farmers won’t get many eggs. And people won’t get to eat them.

Growing Chicks Chickens aren’t fully grown when they hatch from eggs! They have to grow up before they can lay their own eggs. Baby chickens are called chicks. Farmers usually buy chicks from companies that sell them. Special farms hatch eggs into chicks too. You can order chicks on the Internet and in catalogs. Then those companies send chicks through the mail!

Chicken farms often buy baby chicks instead of fully grown chickens. Farmers have to make sure that the chicks grow up healthy. They have to pay special attention to chicks while they’re young so they don’t get sick.

The chicks have to be kept warm and safe while they grow. They are weak and can get sick easily. They have to be kept in small, warm boxes. They can’t just walk around outside on their own. The chicks grow for a few weeks. They lose the soft fluff that covers their bodies, and they grow feathers. Their legs get longer. They start to look like adult chickens.

Egg Laying Why do chickens keep laying eggs? Don’t they get tired of it? The whole point of laying eggs is to hatch chicks. When a rooster fertilizes an egg, it can turn into a baby chick. Back when chickens lived in the wild (thousands of years ago), most eggs got fertilized. Lots of male chickens were around to fertilize the eggs. Now, farmers can keep male chickens away from females. But the hens keep laying eggs. That’s just what their bodies tell them to do. They can’t tell that the eggs haven’t been fertilized and won’t hatch. After a hen lays a bunch of eggs, she sits on them. It doesn’t matter if they’re fertilized or not. Farmers trick hens by taking away the eggs they lay. The hens forget they laid one the day before, and so they lay another. That’s how we get so many eggs.

28 Eggs

The floors of chicken cages aren’t flat. Instead, the cage floors are tilted. That way, eggs roll out from under the chicken. Farmers can easily grab the eggs without bothering the chickens.

How Are Eggs Produced?

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Some chicken farms let their chickens walk around outside, instead of raising them indoors. Chickens raised outdoors are often called “free-range.” That means that chickens can walk outside and find their own food.

When chicks are 20 weeks old, they are old enough to lay eggs. They look like full-grown chickens.

Housing Chickens used to live outside all the time. Farmers kept them in pens. Or they just let them walk around the farm. Sometimes in the country, or even in some cities, you can find chickens running around wherever they want.

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Bigger chicken farms have hundreds or even thousands of chickens. Each chicken lays hundreds of eggs each year. That’s a lot of eggs when farms have thousands of chickens!

Farmers with big farms want to keep their chickens all together. They keep them in cages inside. Sometimes the chickens don’t get much space. Three to five birds live in one cage together. Putting chickens in cages makes it easier for the farmer to collect eggs.

Food If they’re outside, chickens eat whatever they can find. They eat insects and worms. They eat seeds. They eat leaves.

How Are Eggs Produced?

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Getting the right food is an important part of raising chickens. Chickens who eat better food will lay better-tasting eggs. Making sure chickens grow up healthy is a big part of the work farmers have to do.

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Indoors, farmers feed chickens something different. They eat mash. Mash has grain in it. It has corn. Sometimes it has oil from soybeans. The mash is meant to give the chickens everything they need to stay healthy. The better the food chickens eat, the tastier their eggs will be. A sick chicken won’t lay very good eggs. The eggshells might be weak and break easily. The yolk (the yellow part inside eggs) might be really watery and the wrong color. Good food means the chickens will lay good eggs. The eggshell will be strong. And the yolk will be very yellow. Farmers want to make sure their chickens get good food. A chicken needs about four pounds of food to lay a dozen eggs. That turns out to be a lot of food!

Sick Chickens Chickens can get sick, just like people. And sick chickens don’t lay good eggs. Farmers want to keep their chickens nice and healthy. Small farmers can keep a close eye on their chickens. They can see if one gets sick. Then they can give it medicine or keep it away from the other chickens. Sometimes they have to kill the chicken, because it will make others sick.

Organic Have you heard the word “organic?” It means that something is made without chemicals. For fruits and vegetables, it means the farmer didn’t use chemical pesticides to kill bugs or chemical fertilizers to grow fruits or vegetables. Organic farmers want to avoid using chemicals that could poison the ground, animals, and people. But how can eggs be organic? Organic eggs come from organic chickens. Organic chickens have been raised in a certain way. They are fed with organic food that hasn’t been grown with chemicals. They aren’t in cages all the time and can go outside. Then the eggs they lay are called organic. People who buy organic eggs think the eggs are healthier for them, and for the chickens.

How Are Eggs Produced?

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Here you can see where the chickens get their food while they live in cages. You can also see the eggs the chickens have laid. The eggs are now where farmers can reach them easily.

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If the chickens are outside, farmers have to make sure they’re safe. Wild animals like bears and foxes can eat chickens. Many times, farmers will keep chickens safe with a fence. Farmers with bigger farms might have a harder time keeping animals from getting sick. There are lots of chickens packed tightly together. Sickness can spread fast. Some farms might have a veterinarian to help with sick chickens.

The Eggs As long as chickens are healthy and safe and are getting enough good food, they’ll lay lots of eggs. Once a hen lays her egg, the farmer has to collect it. Farmers collect eggs in two ways. One is by hand. Smaller farms have people collect the eggs. Sometimes bigger farms do too. Most places use machines to collect eggs. The eggs roll down onto a conveyer belt . The belt moves along, carrying the eggs to the next step.

How Are Eggs Produced?

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Chapter FIVE

Y

How Do Eggs Get to Your Plate?

ou know that eggs come from chickens. Farmers take care of chickens. But how does the egg get to you from the farm? We have to follow an egg through the rest of its trip from the farm to you.

Staying on the Farm Sometimes the egg doesn’t go very far after it’s laid. The egg farm processes the eggs right there. Processing eggs means checking the eggs, washing them, and packing them. Lots of egg farmers process eggs on the farm. It’s easier then sending them somewhere else to do it. Other farms can’t process the eggs. They don’t have the right machines. Or they don’t produce enough eggs. These farmers send the eggs somewhere else. There are special egg-processing factories in some places. In either case, eggs have to go through the same steps. They must be checked, washed, and packed up.

These eggs have been packed onto skids. Each skid can hold many, many eggs. Skids allow farmers and factory workers to move thousands of eggs without breaking them. No one wants broken eggs!

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Machines move, wash, and pack eggs. Imagine if people had to pack each egg. With thousands of eggs, that would be a lot of work for a lot of people! Instead, machines save people lots of time.

No matter what, it all happens really fast. Eggs don’t stay fresh forever. Farmers want to get their eggs to customers as soon as possible. It usually only takes a few days to get an egg from the chicken to you.

Moving Around Eggs can break easily. So how do they get moved safely around a farm or factory? In lots of very careful ways! Conveyer belts carry the eggs from step to step. In some cases, people carry them instead. A lot of the time, eggs are packed into something called skids. First, a couple dozen eggs are put on trays with a cup for each egg. Then the trays are stacked on top of each other. All together, these stacked trays are called a skid. Skids can hold up to thousands of eggs! As the eggs move from one step to another, they have to be moved off of the skid for washing and packaging. People might do this by hand. Sometimes machines move the eggs. The machines grab the egg and lift it up. Then they place it where it needs to be.

How Do Eggs Get to Your Plate?

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Machines pack eggs into the cartons you buy at the supermarket. The machines have to move the eggs carefully so that none break.

Washing Eggs can be dirty when they’re laid. Most people want clean eggs. Farms have to wash the eggs before they sell them. People who raise their own chickens for eggs sometimes choose not to wash eggs. Eggs have a natural way of keeping germs out. They have a kind of skin on the outside of the shell that you can’t really see—but it’s there. It keeps bacteria from getting into the egg. Once you wash an egg, the part that keeps out germs is washed off. Bacteria could get in. That’s why it’s important to always cook eggs all the way when you buy them at the store. But washing the eggs gets rid of some germs too. And they look nicer. Places that process eggs usually wash them. Farms wash them with warm water and then brush them gently. Warm water helps keep out bacteria. Cold water can actually put bacteria into the egg. Then the eggs are dried off before they move on. Sometimes the eggs are just rubbed with a brush instead of washed with water.

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Candling Eggs go through a step called candling. This is when the eggs are checked closely for any problems. Only healthy eggs are sold to customers. The eggs go into a dark room. The only light comes from a special flashlight. The light is called a candler. This is called candling because of how it used to happen. People would shine candles behind eggs. Now we use flashlights. A person has to do this job. He looks at each egg with the candler. He can tell whether an egg is healthy or not just by shining a light through it! The light goes through the egg and lights up what’s inside. Good candlers can tell if an egg is good to eat or not very quickly. She can tell if it’s too old. Or if the yolk isn’t big enough. The candler puts a grade on the egg. Some farms have a machine that does the grading. The highest grade eggs are for eating at home. The next grade eggs are sent to bakeries. Lowest grade eggs are made into other foods, like dried eggs. Some countries use A, B, and C for their grades. Others use AA, A, and B. The highest-grade eggs have smooth shells that are strong. They have big, oval yolks. And the egg whites are thick. Lower-grade eggs aren’t quite as nice.

Eggs have to go through candling to make sure they are good to eat. People once used real candles to check their eggs. Today, farmers and factory workers use electric lights for candling.

How Do Eggs Get to Your Plate?

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The story of each egg you eat began on a farm. A chicken had to lay that egg. A farmer had to raise that chicken. Your egg had to be moved and washed and packed up before you could buy it. Think about the story of your food next time you have eggs for breakfast!

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Candling at Home You can do some candling yourself at home. All you need is an egg and a flashlight. Turn off the lights and shine your flashlight through the egg, toward you. It will light up the egg, and you will be able to see inside. Can you tell the differences between eggs? One might have a bigger yolk than another. Or different shells. Maybe you’ll even find one with two yolks!

Packing Next, machines carefully pack the eggs into cartons. Eggs normally come twelve together. Sometimes you can find packs of six. In some countries, the eggs are grouped by how big they are. That way, each carton has eggs that are the same size. The eggs might also be stamped. They might be stamped with their grade (A, B, or C). They might be stamped with their size. Or the farm they came from. Take a look at your eggs to see if you can find any information on them.

Leaving the Farm At this point, the eggs have to leave the farm. Or they have to leave the processing factory. It’s time to get sold. The cartons are packed up into trucks. The trucks have to be refrigerated so the eggs stay fresh. Just because eggs can break easily doesn’t mean they don’t travel far. The eggs could stay in the area. Or they could be sent halfway around the world! Eggs from one country could end up in another country. Planes, boats, trucks, and trains are so fast that the eggs don’t go bad on the trip. Eggs can travel to countries around the world in just a few days and still be fresh. Check your next carton of eggs. Does it say where the eggs were laid? Now you can imagine how those eggs got to you!

How Do Eggs Get to Your Plate?

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Broken Shells Even though farms and factories are careful with eggs, some get broken. But farms and factories don’t just throw them away! Broken eggs are collected and made into other foods. They might be made into powdered eggs. Or mayonnaise. Or frozen omelets. Sometimes they’re even collected and used for pet food.

Grocery Stores Now the eggs have a couple more steps to take before you can eat them. First, they go from the farm to the grocery store warehouse. Warehouses collect all the food that will go out to the grocery stores. There might be ten warehouses in a region, but there are a hundred grocery stores. Each warehouse sends food out to ten grocery stores. Stores put eggs in refrigerators. Most people know where the eggs are in their local grocery store. You might pick up a dozen every time you go to the store.

Eating Eggs at Home After you buy your eggs, what do you do with them? Maybe your family makes hard-boiled eggs. Or you eat scrambled eggs for breakfast. Maybe the eggs end up in cookies and cakes. You can do many things with eggs. They’re a good way to get the things your body needs to stay healthy. The next time you eat an egg, think about where it came from. Think about the chicken that laid it. And the farmer that took care of the chicken. Imagine all the steps that egg took to you. You’ll never look at eggs the same way again!

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Words to Know bacteria: Tiny creatures so small you can’t see them. Some can make people sick, but most don’t, and some even help keep people healthy.

conveyer belt: A moving rubber, metal, or fabric piece of a machine that takes things from one place to another.

coop: A chicken house where chickens make nests and lay eggs. customers: People who buy things, including food. fertilized: When an egg has what it needs to hatch into a baby chicken. flocks: Groups of birds, including chickens. ingredients: Foods that are mixed with others to make new foods. local: Near where you live. processed: The way ingredients are mixed or changed in a factory to become the food we eat. produce: To make or gather to sell to others. protein: A part of food that helps build strong muscles and keep people healthy. Meat, milk, and eggs have a lot of protein.

region: An area or part of a country. veterinarian: An animal doctor. whites: The watery clear part of the egg that turns white when cooked.

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Find Out More Online Eggs 42explore.com/eggs.htm

Get Cracking www.eggfarmersofontario.ca

My Pet Chicken www.mypetchicken.com/about-chickens The Science of Eggs www.eurekalert.org/eggs

Where Your Food Comes From urbanext.illinois.edu/food

In Books

Burton, Robert. Egg. New York: DK Children, 2000.

Gibbons, Gail. Chicks and Chickens. New York: Holiday House, 2005.

Lundgren, Julie K. Chickens (Life Cycles). Vero Beach, Fla.: Rourke Publishing, 2011.

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Index bacteria: 40 cages: 23, 27, 29, 31, 33–35 candling: 41, 43 cartons: 40, 43 chicks: 11, 27–28 China: 15, 24, 25

India: 15, 25 international: 9 local: 7–8, 25, 44 machines: 18, 19, 25, 35, 37, 39, 40, 43 organic: 33

Easter: 14, 15, 22 processed foods: 8 protein: 15

factories: 8, 19, 37, 44 farmers: 7–9, 11, 15–17, 19, 23, 25, 27–35, regional: 8–9 37–40 fertilized: 21, 28 rooster: 21, 28 grocery stores: 8, 25, 44

washing: 17, 39, 40

hens: 11, 25, 28

yolks: 43

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About the Author Kim Etingoff lives in Boston, Massachusetts, spending part of her time working on farms. Kim enjoys connecting people of all ages to agriculture and teaching others where their food comes from.

Picture Credits Dreamstime.com Asayenka: p. 34 Baloncici: p. 23 Barbara Helgason: p. 36 Bogdan Carstina: p. 30, 32 Dvmsimages: p. 14 Enrico Jose: p. 17 Fotokon: p. 16 Francois Lariviere: p. 38, 41 Harperdrewart: p. 22 Hong Chan: p. 6 James Mattil: p. 18 Krugloff: p. 10, 12 Les Cunliffe: p. 20 Mark Hryciw: p. 28 Michong: p. 42 Nikkytok: p. 31 Ryan Beiler: p. 29 Spflaum: p. 26, 39, 40 Uptall: p. 24 Vladimir Georgievsky: p. 9

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