HISTORY Because birds preceded man in the evolutionary chain, both eggs and birds have been around longer than historians. Nobody really knows when the first fowl was domesticated although Indian history places the date as early as 3200 B.C. Egyptian and Chinese records show that fowl were laying eggs for man in 1400 B.C. The dependability of the rooster's early morning call and the regularity with which newly laid eggs appeared probably inspired the Chinese to describe fowl as "the domestic animal who knows time."

It is believed that Columbus' ships carried the first of the chickens related to those now in egg production to this country. These strains originated in Asia.