Penguins can be found in South America, Australia and the southern tip of Africa. So definitely a lot more people have access to penguin eggs than one might think.
I've only been once but when I went to Australia it seemed like they were very protective over penguin nesting grounds. We could watch them walk up onto the beach but you couldn't touch them or cross the rope to get closer. Maybe that's not representative of all of Australia but I'd find it hard to believe people there have easy access to penguin eggs. S. America and Africa I'm less sure of as I've never been but in general I'd be surprised if this is common anywhere really.
It was, actually! In was still in elementary school at the time, maybe 11 or so so I got to sit very close. It was pretty incredible to see them all come ashore.
That’s why I love Reddit. It’s a repository for random knowledge from mavens in the wild. You can fall down any of thousands of rabbit holes on a given day.
Are you sure that the eggs are poisonous? I thought they got their poison through their diet by eating poisonous bugs, so I'm not sure if that also translates to their eggs. Not saying that you are wrong just that I never heard about their eggs being poisonous.
You are correct, I believe, but it is thought that the toxin is concentrated in certain areas of their body and spreads to the eggs, whether during gestation or by sitting on them we don't know. And I don't think it's 100% confirmed they are, I think it may be something where they eat too many of the beetles around the time of fertilization it rubs off on the baby's.
Supposedly the toxins they get from the beetles - a distant relative to the beetles that poison dart frogs get their toxins from - accumulate largely in the skin and feathers in the chest and belly area. They rub these feathers against their eggs which makes the exterior shell of the eggs toxic. But supposedly you cannot eat the flesh of these birds without some serious preparation to remove toxins so I wouldn't be surprised if the eggs themselves are poisonous as well.
Some sources that ive found when digging about this say that it is believed that the birds "rub the toxin on their eggs and chicks", leading me to believe that the eggs are indeed edible so long as you prevent any contamination from the bird / outside of the egg with the eggs contents.
I follow someone online who eats her parakeet’s eggs when she lays them. Idk why it’s so hard to wrap my mind around, when there’s nothing weirder about it than a chicken egg.
Makes me wonder if we domesticated poultry because their eggs and meat taste best, or if their eggs and meat taste “normal” to us because they happen to be the ones we domesticated.
I believe it's more to do with their predisposition for being domesticated. They're social animals that can eat almost anything, are easy to catch, don't stop laying, breed easily and produce eggs of a good size.
Taste was likely a minor concern compared to an easy and reliable source of food.
I have a conure laying unfertilized eggs RIGHT NOW and every time I go to toss one I stop and think... am I throwing away a delicacy? I should be at least trying this, right? But then I'm like, that came from my pet bird. This is so weird. But the temptation...
We domesticated chickens because they're small, easily kept and controlled in fenced off areas with roofs. Their meat tastes good and they're able to eat scraps of food that would otherwise get thrown out. They're also great at pest control in gardens.
It’s the latter- chickens are a domesticated version of the Red Jungle Fowl which has a unique survival strategy thanks to evolving in SE Asian bamboo forests.
Most birds do not lay eggs super often, the Red Jungle Fowl lays eggs based on the abundance of food. This is because these bamboo forests have a 50 year flowering cycle, so animals which evolved in tandem with these environments did so to take advantage of the ABUNDANT food that happened during the flowering cycle.
I doubt taste had anything to do with the way humans became egg eaters. Eggs are wonderful little bundles of fat and protein which is exactly what a primitive hunter gatherer would prize in a food. Obvious they didn't know about fats and proteins but I am sure they notices eggs made them feel good.
Penguin meat is described as having a unique flavor profile, often likened to a combination of dark poultry and fish. It is said to have a rich, slightly gamey taste, with some comparisons to venison and alligator in texture. Historical accounts describe it as tasting like beef, codfish, and duck roasted together with a sauce made from blood and cod liver oil. The meat is oily due to penguins' diet high in krill, which contributes to its fishy flavor. However, eating penguins is generally discouraged due to their endangered status and legal protections
To put this in perspective, when the original explorers were going around all over the place. They decided to eat the Aldabra Tortoises to near extinction, and didn't touch the penguins at all
Ive seen this shit in goat sim 3 and I thought they were just comically large marshmallows cuz the games just weird af I didn’t realize those “marshmallows” were based off real things lmao
Hahaha. I always called those farm-mallows. They're bales of silage (high-moisture grass or other green trimmings, sometimes entire corn crops--fruit and all--mulched up) sealed up to ferment. It's a staple livestock food or additive, depending on the livestock.
I’d eat penguin eggs. My family raises free rnge chickens for eggs, meat, and the occasional rare sale, so I’ve seen what chickens eat. everything from horse poop to cockroaches they will eat anything if given the chance.Penguins, on the other hand, have a seafood-based diet, which sounds way cleaner. Their eggs might actually be a little better.
The ducks we typically get eggs from (puddle/dabbling ducks), especially in domesticated settings eat fairly similar diets to chickens. Largely plant matter with some insects here and there. Different plants and different insects maybe, but this makes for pretty similar building blocks. If you were to get eggs from diving ducks, like merganser's, which eat much more fish/amphibians etc. you may have a different taste.
This depends entirely on what the duck is eating. I’ve eaten delicious and disgusting duck eggs. My ducks’ eggs went funny once when I tried a new feed. Went back to the original and they tasted alright again.
How do the clear whites feel? Idk why, but when I look at this picture, I always think the whites feel very rubbery and firm, unlike regular boiled chicken eggs.
Falklands Islands. I was living there for a while and was told by the locals that this is a tradition for some of them. Since some penguins have small nests on the ground, they just went there with a bucket and picked a few of them. Not sure if this is true but we were told that the first egg just after winter will be weaker so if they will pick up the first one, they will lay another and since it was Spring already and they have access to better food, the second egg would be better and the chick will be stronger.
Honestly this guy above is just cruel and heartless to animals. These guys are on the edge of extinction. They fight for their lives every day and we humans come along and scramble their eggs. It’s just sick and cruel.
Any true gentleman would poach these with Hollandaise sauce with a good English muffin.
Jokes aside, this actually made me look up the conservation status of Penguins. I had no idea they were endangered.
Turns out the species I most associate with penguins are generally either "Least Concern" or "Near threatened.", but there are multiple species that are either Endangered or nearly extinct.
I guess the lesson wasn't "Penguins are endangered" so much as it was "There are more species of penguins than I was aware of."
Your sarcasm isn’t appreciated; this is serious. Penguins are endangered and their eggs taste much better fried, over-medium, on toast with some cheese and bacon.
Had to be an Internet sleuth because no one is commenting on this:
“The taste is somewhat fishy as krill form a major part of the diet,” said Headland. “A personal comment is that penguin eggs taste much better when you are hungry.” “They weren't so tasty once boiled and needed vinegar to make them edible,” said Morrison, but “I made a pavlova with one egg, and it was beautiful.”
They do not taste nice. They have a very strong fishy smell and taste. And don't believe the lie about the vinegar, no amount of vinegar will mask this.
When you are cooking something with a strong taste profile you have 2 options, you can try to mask it or you can try to compliment it, Boiling does neither of these things. I can't even imagine wanting to eat this boiled lol
here is sauce :
Penguin egg whites turn clear when boiled. This is because the glycoprotein that would typically make chicken eggs white, ovalbumin, is less present in penguin eggs; there is more of another glycoprotein, called penalalbumin
Not all penguins, and the ones here are from Gentoo penguins from the Falkland Islands, which are classed as near-threatened, but are actually rapidly increasing their range southwards while they decline in other areas, and are able to lay multiple eggs per season if their first is eaten, since multiple egg thieves exist naturally where they nest (gulls, caracaras, and the now extinct Falkland Islands Fox). People collect eggs too, but now you need a permit to do so, it's only done on a small scale, and the penguins outnumber the human population of the islands vastly, around 3500 compared to around a million Gentoos, so the practice alone isn't a threat to them.
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u/mgkqpz 5d ago
Now I’m curious where you are from because you have easy access to penguins eggs