I hatched out my EE in mid May and she laid her first egg this week and it was light brown. She hatched out from a green egg. Will my EE eventually lay green eggs or will she continue to lay brown ones? What is your experience/opinion? Thanks!
Quote:Well technically, even if dad had the brown gene, the hen could lay green if Mom laid green (blue shell, brown on the shell) which is how most green eggs work...light brown over blue (olive eggers are dark brown over blue)... However in this case it sound like either the blue is so light it doesn't make the egg green, or (more likely) there are white egg genes floating around and the hen inherited those so she's just laying a white egg with brown overlay. While the shade/depth of color the hen starts with may darken, I've never heard of a hen actually changing egg color, so brown it is. Simplified but I hope that makes sense
I believe it's because there is more than one gene for egg color. If a chicken inherits even one gene for blue shells, it will express as either blue (no brown overlay) or green (brown overlay). BUT, since mom was EE, she may have had both blue and white rather than two blues and the white was passed to her daughter. The rooster either had only one as well or he had none to pass down.
