I have an 9 yr old SS hen and she had less speckles when in the first year, and got more and more with each molt. I remember asking about it and was told this is what to expect.
In addition to the above advice, I’d make sure her eggs are reliably fertile. When you crack them open, the yolk should have an obvious ‘bullseye’ on it, not just a white dot.
Here are a couple more pics I took of the swans in FL. The mutes were in a separate pond, but various ducks and wild waterfowl would fly over the fence and join them. So they apparently got along.
This is a black necked swan, one of many, in a lake in Pompano Beach FL. There are a lot of them living with various waterfowl there at a retirement village where my mom spent her final years. All the birds seem to get along. They did have 2 mute swans, who were kept separate because they...
(Not an entry). Well both her parents are Spitzhauben. This is Margarita, hatched on a Cinco de Mayo, and unlike her siblings, she certainly does not have the correct forward facing Spitz crest. However she’s the sweetest, friendliest hen I’ve got. She has had a ‘haircut’ since the photo was...
I gave my bantam EE hen eggs to hatch this year. Mainly because I’ve never been able to break her of broodiness, unlike all the others I’ve had success with. I gave her 3 little blue eggs, and 2 hatched on Wed. The plan was, she would do everything herself and raise the babies in the flock...