{"id":366982,"date":"2026-10-07T16:54:44","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T16:54:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/366982\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T16:54:44","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T16:54:44","slug":"ask-dr-universe-queens-gazette-17","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/366982\/","title":{"rendered":"Ask Dr. Universe – Queens Gazette"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Dr. Universe: Why Don\u2019t We Eat Reptile Eggs? \u2014 Bella, 7, Arizona\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dear Bella,\u00a0<\/p>\n

I love cracking an egg over my morning kibble. It keeps my fur sleek.\u00a0I asked my friend Ryan Wagner about eggs.\u00a0He\u2019s\u00a0a biologist at Washington State University. He studies reptiles and amphibians.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He told me that many people do eat reptile eggs.\u00a0\u201cReptile eggs are eaten as a delicacy by many cultures,\u201d\u00a0Wagner said.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s\u00a0not\u00a0very common\u00a0in the United States. But in Central and South America, iguana eggs have been eaten for thousands of years. And traditional communities often eat turtle\u00a0eggs\u2014especially sea turtle eggs\u2014for sustenance, religious purposes,\u00a0and traditional\u00a0medicine.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some places make rules about\u00a0who can\u00a0eat which\u00a0reptile eggs\u00a0and how they can harvest them. That helps protect endangered or threatened reptiles like sea turtles. Commercially or illegally harvesting those eggs risks losing all sea turtles.\u00a0You\u2019re\u00a0definitely not\u00a0going to find reptile eggs at the grocery store.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Humans spent thousands of years domesticating birds.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0how we got\u00a0chickens.\u00a0Laying chickens\u00a0give\u00a0around 250 to 300 eggs every year.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0about one egg per day for most of the year. They\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0need to mate with a rooster to lay eggs. So, those are unfertilized eggs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The wild ancestor of the chicken is still alive\u2014the red\u00a0junglefowl. These birds only lay 10 to 15 eggs each year. That happens once a year when food is easy to find. Those eggs may be fertilized or unfertilized.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are more than 12,000 kinds of reptiles. Many of them are seasonal breeders.\u00a0\u201cIf you keep a turtle or a snake or a lizard, it\u2019s not regularly laying unfertilized eggs,\u201d\u00a0Wagner said.\u00a0\u201cMost reptiles lay eggs one time of year, often right after overwintering.\u201d\u00a0Farming reptile eggs would be tricky. Reptile biology is complex.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0less understood than chicken biology\u2014partly because people have farmed chickens for so long.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Reptiles are cold-blooded\u00a0and many are solitary. Their body temperature adjusts to the temperature outside. A keeper must manage the temperature and moisture for each individual enclosure.\u00a0Many reptiles mature slowly. So, it could be years before they mate and lay eggs.\u00a0Most reptiles lay soft-shelled eggs. The leathery shells allow the egg to\u00a0suck up\u00a0moisture from the environment. That keeps it from drying out. These eggs need careful handling and moisture control during transport, too.\u00a0Reptile eggs can also\u00a0contain\u00a0Salmonella.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0bacteria that sometimes makes people sick. Farmers work hard to keep chicken eggs free of these bacteria. They would need stronger strategies to farm reptile eggs.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0because reptiles are more likely to carry Salmonella in their\u00a0gut.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Maybe early\u00a0humans could have domesticated a reptile\u2014instead of the red\u00a0junglefowl. They\u00a0probably could\u00a0have figured out how to keep them. The reptile might have adapted to living with people and providing eggs.\u00a0But it\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0make sense to switch now. At least 21% of reptiles are at risk of extinction.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0why biologists like Wagner study them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Outside of harvesting by traditional communities, I-guana\u00a0say\u00a0reptiles are better suited for our appreciation than our breakfast table.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sincerely,\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dr. Universe\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ask Dr. Universe is a science-education project from Washington State University. Visit AskDrUniverse.wsu.edu to read more Q&A\u2019s, or to send in a science question of your own \u2013 or that of a kid you know \u2013 for a chance to be featured in a future Q&A. Or you can write to: Ask Dr. Universe Washington State University ITB 2013B Pullman, WA 99164\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Sea turtles are marine reptiles. Sea turtle moms swim back to a beach near where they were born.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0where they lay about 100 eggs in sandy nests. The eggs look like soft ping-pong balls.\u00a0\u00a0Cynthia Rubio\/USFWS\u00a0<\/p>\n

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This white leghorn hen is the most common breed of laying chicken. The red junglefowl is the living, wild ancestor of all chickens. Dejungen CC BY-SA 3.0,\u00a0 JJ Harrison CC BY-SA 3.0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dr. Universe: Why Don\u2019t We Eat Reptile Eggs? \u2014 Bella, 7, Arizona\u00a0 \u00a0 Dear Bella,\u00a0 I love cracking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":366983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-366982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/366983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}