Colorado

[644171]

Hen's can lay two different colors????

I see that brown one that was encased in that white one...

I think it would be cool for a chicken to lay black,yellow,purple,violet,bronze, and goldish colored eggs..............How does one make or breed a chicken to lay different colored eggs....... How did the easter eggers come about..

 

[FrogEggs]

Different types of chickens lay different eggs. There is nothing you can do to change the egg color of a particular chicken.

http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2012/01/how-hen-makes-egg-egg-oddities.html?m=1

Explains the egg laying process, and the "egg inside an egg" phenomenon.

Some breeds lay white, some brown, some blue. Green is a from a hen of mixed blue and brown egg-laying lineage....

 

[644171]

Different types of chickens lay different eggs. There is nothing you can do to change the egg color of a particular chicken.

http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2012/01/how-hen-makes-egg-egg-oddities.html?m=1

Explains the egg laying process, and the "egg inside an egg" phenomenon.

Some breeds lay white, some brown, some blue. Green is a from a hen of mixed blue and brown egg-laying lineage....

Still want to see different egg colors....Well I learned a bit...

When do I need to switch my chicks off of their chick starter...

 

[wsmith]

Hen's can lay two different colors????

I see that brown one that was encased in that white one...

I think it would be cool for a chicken to lay black,yellow,purple,violet,bronze, and goldish colored eggs..............How does one make or breed a chicken to lay different colored eggs....... How did the easter eggers come about..

A hen can lay eggs that gradually go lighter or darker over her lifetime, but the basic color itself doesn't change.

From what I have read, chicken eggs can be many different colors or shades, but the INSIDE color of the shell will either be Blue or White.

EEs are a cross breed mix. They probably came about during the development of the Ameracauna chicken, which was developed from the Araucana chickn of South America. There are actually several "native" chicken breeds to South America. Many of these were rumpless (no tail) with beards and muffs, and some with ear tufts. Most of these laid eggs of different shades of blue. Sometimes you will see pink as well. Crossed with other breeds, you get olive eggs and varieties of green.

The color of the outside of the shell is determined by the breed and is applied in the egg ducts as the shell forms and it moves down the duct. Most of my Doms lay a medium-brown egg, while another lays a light tan egg. The light tan egg is very thin shelled, and sometimes isn't fully hardened when laid, so when we collect the eggs that one frequently is flat on one side from sitting in the nest. Weird.

 

[wsmith]

Well we were expecting a double yolk, didn't expect a whole 'nother egg inside

That's AWESOME! you need to frame the photo. What breed chicken laid it?

 

[wsmith]

When do I need to switch my chicks off of their chick starter...

That depends on a couple of things. Many people don't switch them off starter until the pullets are at the point of lay, which depending on the breed and the line, could be anywhere from 16-30 weeks. Some people just feed the chickens an "all flock" type, and forgo the starter/grower altogether. I prefer to feed them non-medicated starter/grower until about 10-12 weeks old, or there about and then, depending on the situation, get them ready to go in with the older birds in the main flock. The ones that aren't going to stay with the main flock will be transitioned to an all flock type feed until they go live somewhere else or are processed.

I would rather "place" pullets with someone's flock than to process them. Dominique pulets are on the smallish side when compared to the cockerels. Cockerels at my place are processed at about 24-26 weeks, and only a couple of them "make the cut" for potential breeding cocks. Everybody else gets eaten, unless someone wants to buy a cockerel.

 

[Chesterchook]

That's AWESOME! you need to frame the photo. What breed chicken laid it?

It was a red star. The outside shell looks white in this picture but is a light tan. I imagine it had the same amount of pigment as the smaller egg, just ended up stretched out.

 

[wsmith]

Does anyone know at what age they start clucking instead of peeping? Right now they sound like the songbirds that wake me up at 3 in the morning.

Depends on the breed and rate of maturity. Mine moved from peeping to a peep-cluck sort of noise, then to clucking very gradually. By the time they start to lay, they will be clucking......

 

[wsmith]

It was a red star. The outside shell looks white in this picture but is a light tan. I imagine it had the same amount of pigment as the smaller egg, just ended up stretched out.

Cool. The tiny egg we got last week was much darker than normal. Very cool though. IU'd heard of that occuring, but had never seen it. Thanks for sharing it.

 

[ScottLovelandCO]

I may just have to give that a try. I have a few coolers sitting around that I could be doing something with. I may go with a wafer thermostat as they are more accurate though. And would like to stay away from the ligh bulb heating. I will bet I can find something on ebay to use. Maybe a 12 volt system????? hmmmm

They are more accurate but I had really good luck with my cheap system. The lower t-stat for a water heater is $8. My temperature went from 98 (light off) - 101 (light on). The light was on for about 12 minutes and off for 8 minutes.

I put in 23 eggs to start. At day 7 I had 5 that didn't show anything upon candling. 3 were infertile and 2 just didn't take for whatever reason. Maybe they weren't fertile, I couldn't really tell. So 18 eggs made it to lockdown. Of those 18, 16 have hatched. The other two showed life at lockdown so I'm not sure what happened. They have until I get off of work to hatch or I'm going to crack them open and see what happened. I tapped the shell and candled and didn't get any peeps.

So depending on how you measure success,

Total LOT 16/23 = 69.56%
Total @ Lockdown 16/18 = 88.88%

I am happy with either measurement!