Egg Farmers of Canada released an egg farming trivia challenge
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
Eggs were in the spotlight Friday for World Egg Day.
The International Egg Commission established the day in 1996 to celebrate the industry and promote the significance of eggs. Celebrations occur on the second Friday in October.
Canada has more than 1,200 egg farmers.
Together, they produce about 9 billion eggs, or about 750 million dozen, for Canadians to enjoy.
To celebrate these producers and the humble egg, Egg Farmers of Canada created the Earthwise Egg Quest: Canadian Egg Farming Trivia Challenge.
The downloadable game features two dozen questions about Canadian eggs and how farmers raise them while caring for the planet.
One question, for example, asks if Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan or B.C. is home to the country’s first ever egg barn that produces almost no greenhouse gas emissions.
The answer is Alberta.
“The barn, for example, has a roof lined with 100 solar panels which provides power and helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the process,” the game sheet says.
Agriculture and Agri-Food Minister Lawrence MacAulay celebrated Canadian egg farmers online.
The hard work farmers put in is evident in the product they produce, he said.
“Today we’re celebrating #worldeggday with gratitude for our hardworking Canadian egg farmers,” he said on X. “Your dedication to quality and nutrition is the reason our eggs are the best in the world!”
Here are some egg-celent facts and beliefs about eggs:
- Ancient Egyptians believed Ra, the sun god, hatched from a cosmic egg.
- The colour of a hen’s earlobes can help indicate what colour egg it will lay. White earlobes mean white eggs while red or brown earlobes mean brown eggs.
- Because eggs symbolize fertility, farmers would scatter broken eggs into their fields hoping for abundant crops.
- The protein in an egg is equal to the protein in an ounce of meat.
- The Araucana chicken is called the Easter Egg chicken because it can lay blue, green, brown and pink eggs.
- Finding two yolks in one egg means someone you know will get married or have twins.
And here are some pop culture references related to eggs.
In 1976’s Rocky, Sylvester Stallone’s character famously drank raw eggs as part of his training routine to absorb as much protein as possible.
The Journal of Nutrition, however, found that the availability of egg protein is about 91 per cent in cooked eggs compared to about 50 per cent with raw eggs.
Batman lore also had an egg reference.
During the 1960s TV show, one of the caped crusader’s foes was named Egghead.
He had a pale bald head and wore a white and yellow suit. He believed himself to be the world’s smartest criminal and would use egg puns in his speech and weapon choices.
“Long ago my superior intellect deduced that Batman must be a person who was a millionaire and didn’t have to work, because crimefighting is such an eggspensive hobby,” he says in one episode.
And in Ukraine, the central part of a museum is shaped like an egg.
This belongs to the Pysanka Museum, a museum dedicated to pysanka, the tradition of decorating eggs in Slavic culture.
The museum has more than 10,000 decorated eggs in its collection.