A farmer in Australia was in for a big surprise when he went to collect eggs from his hens. One hen had laid an egg three times bigger than usual, weighing 6.2 ounces.
The massive egg was found at Stockman’s Eggs, a farm in north Queensland’s Atherton Tablelands. Scott Stockman, who runs the farm, shared a photo of the unusual egg on social media. The picture showed the giant egg next to a regular one, making the size difference clear.
But the real surprise came when they cracked it open. Inside was another fully formed egg.
Scott was amazed. “It’s just incredible to see two perfect eggs inside each other,” he told ABC News Australia.
Even experts were shocked. Raf Freire, a professor from Charles Sturt University, said he had never seen anything like it.
He explained that the hen likely produced a normal egg but didn’t lay it. “Instead of laying the egg, the hen released another ovum the next day. The new egg then formed around the first one,” he told ABC News.
This rare event is called a counter-peristalsis contraction. It happens when a second egg starts forming before the first one is laid. This leads to one egg forming around the other.
Experts confirmed that the egg would have been safe to eat, but Scott didn’t bother trying it. “We collect 50,000 eggs a day, so we just left it,” he said.
The story quickly caught attention online, with people amazed by the rare find. Many had never seen or heard of such an egg before.
Scott’s farm, Stockman’s Eggs, is known for its free-range chickens. But even with thousands of eggs laid every day, this one stood out as something truly rare.