Thursday, May 29, 2014

Mystery ? ? ?

A couple days ago a young lady called me to say she'd found an egg near the turn off to the Lower Southfork Road. She thought it was a pelican egg as there were some of those birds nearby in the water. When I got it I knew it wasn't a pelican, they're spotted but on a white background. So far I've sent this photo to Dr. John Fitzpatrick at the Cornell Ornithology Lab, Chuck Preston at the museum here in Cody, Doug Faulkner, a very knowledgeable bird person in CO and even to Paul J. Baicich, one of the authors of the book Nests, Eggs, and Nestlings of North American Birds. It has hundreds of photos of actual eggs from hundreds of bird species so thought he might know.

This egg is 2 3/8" long and as you can see rather dark colored with darker spots and swirls. I'm not sure it is viable but the egg is now in my incubator and will stay there for a while to see what happens. Either hatch, explode or just sit there. I've candled it but am not sure what I'm seeing other than the yolk. I'll keep you posted.

2 comments:

  1. What ever happened to the egg Susan?

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  2. I found out via an egg heart monitor, yes, there is such a tiny machine, that it wasn't viable. It's sitting on my kitchen counter drying out so I can donate it to our local museum. I still haven't found out what it is either.

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