The Dimensions of the Average Ostrich Egg

The ostrich lives on the flat plains of Africa. It's the largest bird in the world and has the world's largest egg. One male ostrich has three to five females in its harem. The females lay the eggs in a communal nest. Each nest contains about a dozen eggs, which take 40 days to hatch. Ostriches used to live in Syria and Arabia, but became extinct in 1941. As of the 20th and 21st century, the ostrich lives in North Africa from Morocco to the Republic of the Sudan. They were brought to Australia for domestication and still live there.

  1. Ostrich Characteristics

    • The tallest bird in the world, an adult male ostrich can reach 9 feet tall and weigh 330 pounds. The male ostrich is mostly black with white plumes in the tail and wings, even though ostriches do not fly. The females have brown feathers. For both males and females, the head and neck are red and bluish. They are strong runners and have powerful, long legs that they also use as weapons. Both male and female ostriches have long eyelashes.

    The Egg Size

    • The ostrich egg weighs 3.5 to 5 lbs. and is the biggest egg in the world. However, it is small compared to the size of bird that laid it. The shell, which runs from a pearl white to a cream color, is about 5 to 7 inches in length and 15 to 18 inches around. The shell is about 0.06 inches thick and can withstand the weight of an adult man.

    Size in Comparison to Other Eggs

    • Small birds lay large eggs in proportion to their body, and large birds lay small eggs in proportion to their body. For example, a wren's egg weighs about 13 percent of a wren's weight, while an ostrich egg lays less than 2 percent of the adult's weight. While the ostrich egg is the largest, a hummingbird's egg is the smallest. The average size of an ostrich egg is 6 inches long, while a humming bird's egg is about the size of a jelly bean or pea. Two dozen hen eggs can fit inside the shell of one ostrich egg.

    Cooking and Serving Size

    • The egg yolk and white do very well when cooked. They're fluffier than hen's eggs but taste like them. However, it takes a long time to cook an ostrich egg -- an hour for a soft-cooked egg and an hour and a half for a hard-cooked egg. One egg provides about 2,000 calories and is about 47 percent protein and 44 percent fat. Basically, the serving size would be enough for 12 people if each person's proportion equaled that of two hen eggs.