EE egg shell colour

[Afterburner]

My EE, which has both a beard and ear muffs, finally started laying a few weeks. What threw me off into disbelief that she was laying is that her eggs have a light brown, almost white egg shell colour. I was under the impression that green legs, muff and beards meant the birds had genes for green eggs, am I mistaken?

Secondly, since my EE already has traits that lean it more toward the cross breeds that were mixed with her distant Amerucan/Aracan forefathers, would she avoid the dreaded winter egg production shutdown that EE suffer from?

 

[Wishing4Wings]

It's really the presence of a pea comb that indicates the best chance for blue/green eggs. The genes for these two traits lie very close together on the chromosome and are usually inherited together, but it's not 100%. Beards,/muffs and green legs are not at all related to the blue egg gene, but frequently help to identify EEs as they are commonly passed down from the Ameraucana ancestry.

I have read that breeding with white egg layers can dilute the blue egg color (which I believe is dominant), and so may be what is happening with your EE. Check the inside of the egg shell, under the membrane to see if there is any blue pigment in the shell. Any brown coating is deposited on the outer layer of the shell.

Were your EEs from a hatchery? Most hatcheries claim blue, green, pink, and brown as the possible colors for their EE eggs. My hatchery girl is one of my best layers, 5 or 6 eggs per week. There will be a winter slow down for many, but a total shut down is not always the case.

 

[Afterburner]

Thanks for the reply, me EE is a hatchery bird. The inner membrane appears to be white. It is hard to tell. She does have a pea comb, about the same size as my last EE who was a green egg layer. just like yours, is is a very good layer, I'm getting about four eggs a week from her. She is holding her own when it comes to egg laying with both my Barred Rock and Australope. All of the above birds were hatched late April/early May of this year.

 

[Wishing4Wings]

I have done some reading about blue shell color, and some research shows that you can influence the darkness of the color by feeding lots of dark leafy greens and other foods high in carotinoids. Maybe you can get her whitish shell to look a bit greener!

Also, not sure if I explained well enough, but it's not the color of the membrane (they're always white) but the color of the inner shell when you peel back the membrane. Compare the inside of the shell to the outside and see if there's a hint of blue. The inside won't be masked by any brown overlay.