What happens to the baby chick in an unhatched egg you use in meals? Does it become the yolk?

Answer 1

Eggs we eat (ie boiled, fried, etc) do not have a baby chick in them at all as they have not been fertilised.

Answer 2

I think I will start at the beginning... an egg is the ovum (female reproductive cell) produced by female chickens. An egg only develops into a baby chick if the egg cell has been fertilized by the sperm from a rooster who mates with the hen before the egg is laid. If the egg is not fertilized it is merely the single reproductive cell of a hen and it will never develop into a fetus. Commercially produced eggs are unfertilised because the hens are separated from the roosters.

If the egg is fertilised the chick feeds on the egg yolk, but does not turn into it, or develop from it.

Excerpt from Wikipedia...
An egg yolk is the part of an egg which serves as the food source for the developing embryo inside. The yolk together with the germinal disc is a single cell. The egg yolk is suspended in the egg white (known more formally as albumen or ovalbumin) by one or two spiral bands of tissue called the Chalazae.

Egg white is the common name for the clear liquid (also called albumen or glair/glaire) contained within an egg. It is the cytoplasm of the egg, which until fertilization is a single cell. It consists mainly of about 10% proteins dissolved in water. Its primary purpose is to protect the egg yolk and also to provide additional nutrition for the growth of the embryo, as it is rich in proteins and is of high nutritional value.

Fertilization: The yolk is released into the oviduct (a long, spiraling tube in the hen's reproductive system), where it can be fertilized internally (inside the hen) by a sperm.

The Egg White (albumin): The yolk continues down the oviduct (whether or not it is fertilized) and is covered with a membrane (called the vitelline membrane), structural fibers, and layers of albumin (the egg white). This part of the oviduct is called the magnus.

The Chalazae: As the egg goes down through the oviduct, it is continually rotating within the spiraling tube. This movement twists the structural fibers (called the chalazae), which form rope-like strands that anchor the yolk in the thick egg white. There are two chalazae anchoring each yolk, on opposite ends of the egg.

The Eggshell: The eggshell is deposited around the egg in the lower part of the oviduct of the hen, just before it is laid. The shell is made of calcite, a crystalline form of calcium carbonate.

This entire trip through the oviduct takes about one day.

germinal disc or blastodisc - a small, circular, white spot (2-3 mm across) on the surface of the yolk; it is where the sperm enters the egg. The nucleus of the egg is in the blastodisc.

Growth of the Embryo: The fertilized blastodisc (now called the blastoderm) grows and becomes the embryo. As the embryo grows, its primary food source is the yolk. Waste products (like urea) collect in a sack called the allantois. The exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide gas occurs through the eggshell; the chorion lines the inside surface of the egg and is connected to the blood vessels of the embryo.
The Incubation Period: The embryo develops inside the egg for 21 days (the incubation period), until a chick pecks its way out of its eggshell and is hatched.

Answer 3

The yolk is nothing but a food source for a developing chick. The actual chick would develop from that little white spot(called a germ spot) you see on the yolk if the egg is fertile and incubated...however, most store bought eggs are not fertilized so there is no worry of seeing any part of a chick in them. If they are from a home raised population, and you miss an egg for sometime while a hen is incubating it, then you may see some veins and such depending on how long it's been incubated.

But no, a chick doesn't become yolk, it actually eats the yolk as it develops.

Answer 4

oh dear....the answer about "the cockeral fertilising the egg after " is wrong. Thats like saying is a bloke jumps on the menstrual waste of a women it will turn into a baby.

Cockerals mate with hens just like most other animals.

Its not a "baby chick". The eggs you buy are from unfertilised eggs so will never be a chick.

The yolk is the protein sack that the chick grows around in a fertilised egg.

The yolk contains enough protein to keep the chick alive for a couple of days without feeding.

Answer 5

The yolk is the baby chick if the egg has been fertilised. Most eggs in supermarkets are not fertilised and so the yolk is a baby chick waiting to happen.

Sometimes if you buy eggs from free range farms, there is a little speck of blood in the yolk.

This is a baby chick happening and you are eating the chick in its first few days of development.

Answer 6

Commercially sold eggs r unfertilised n therefore there is no chick but if u've got ur own chooks (including rooster) n eat their eggs; then u might occassionally come across a blood spot or a thicker mass attached to the yolk. Thats the bundle of cells that would have become the chick. The yolk is there to feed them n the white n shell r there to provide a safe n sterile environment to grow in.

Answer 7

The yolk is the food for the young chick, the "white" is the protective membrane and there is also an air sack for the chick to breathe. an egg will only become a chick if it is fertilised and then only if it is incubated. If it has been fertilised and not incubated the "chick" is basically a microscopic group of cells, if that.
This is why i don't understand vegans.

Answer 8

The yolk is the part of the egg, that becomes a chick. If the egg isn't fertilised the yolk doesn't become a chick.

Answer 9

The yolk is the unfertized foetus/egg, like male sperm. There was never a baby chick there because it was never fertilized / inseminated. If it was you would see a bloody clot, or a small chick, but these do not get past the screening process of the egg producer.

Answer 10

We consume unfertilized eggs, so there is no baby chick in them. However if you grew up on/around a farm, there is a chance you can a fertilized egg by accident. These eggs have blood in them when cracked open if left long enough. Once fertilized the yolk becomes the baby chick while the egg white is the "food" it uses to develop.

Answer 11

the yolk is the part of the egg which is supposed to be the food for the baby chick - for the rest, read post above