Collecting the day’s eggs, he came to the end of the wire cages to find a surprise, an egg size of a soda can.

Earlier this month, one of Muscarella’s Black Giant hens gave him an egg 2.5 inches wide, 3.4 inches tall and 8 inches around.

June 20 he was again surprised with an egg the same size in width and diameter, and only one-sixteenth of an inch shorter. Both eggs are the same width as a tennis ball.

Originally from New Jersey, Muscarella and his wife Merry moved to Salisbury in 1990. “One of the things we like about living in North Carolina is to do the things we couldn’t do in New Jersey,” he said.

They had a friend in New Jersey who owned a rooster and the town made her get rid of it, he said.

That has not been the case in Rowan County.

Eric finally took a job at Food Lion. Their younger son, John, wasn’t interested in filling his brother’s footprints.

So Tony and Merry took over the responsibility. Today raising chickens is a hobby for them. They sell the eggs for $1 per carton to friends, neighbors and co-workers. The money they raise pays for the feed.

The hobby didn’t stop with chickens. The Muscarellas have two cats, two dogs, three peacocks and a miniature pygmy goat named Coco. The 3-year-old goat is expected to give them two or more kids soon.

But back to the chicken. What is in store for this eggstraordinary bird?

Typically hens begin laying at about 5-months-old and can produce an egg each day for about a year. Then they decrease in egg production, living another two to three years.

Since she is a year old, this hen has another six months of good egg laying. The Muscarellas hope to mate her with a rooster to see if they can get more hens that lay similar sized eggs.

The eggs themselves will be kept. When the Muscarellas opened the first one, laid on June 4, they found one yolk and another whole egg inside, shell intact. “There is an egg inside the egg ... unbelievable,” Tony Muscarella said after opening it.

Kenn Anderson, associate professor and poultry extension specialist for N.C. State University, has seen two such eggs in his 33-year career.

Anderson explained that the regular-size egg, found inside the big egg, went through the normal reproductive process. As the egg was ready to be laid, something put stress on the hen, causing the muscles to reverse. The egg was forced back into the magnum of the reproductive tract, and another egg formed around it.