egg changed color ?

[meandfowl]

Just started a new flock of chickens this spring.I have 2 R.R. that are 22 weeks and 6 australorps that are 16 wks One of my R.R. started laying about 2 wks ago every afternoon i would get a brown smallish egg. This morning I watched my other R.R. go in and lay a large brown egg YAY. So this afternoon I go to collect my little brown egg and it is light/pale not the brown she was laying but same size and shape. Can a hen egg color change that much in one day or is one of the 16 wk olds now laying? It was the same time of day that my RR usually lays and i saw her in the coop area just before i checked so im pretty sure it was her.

 

[Chickassan]

It can change that much, sometimes they just run low on paint back there.

 

[meandfowl]

It can change that much, sometimes they just run low on paint back there.

Thank you. I have never seen one change that much that quick lol I guess she is still working all the kinks out

 

[Chickassan]

I had a blue egger lay a snow white egg.I understand the confusion.

 

[dunnmom]

My BOs usually lay light to medium brown eggs, but occasionally I get some that are so light they are nearly pink. Two days ago I found one that was off-white. I've found that egg color and size with my girls is pretty inconsistent, although the trend (not the rule) seems to be the bigger the egg the lighter the color.

 

[aart]

I had a blue egger lay a snow white egg.I understand the confusion.

Not likely.
The blue pigment is in the shell, is part of it,
it's not a coating like the brown,
which can easily vary from day to day,
and later on in the cycle(spring to fall cycle).

 

[Chickassan]

Not likely but true. She is not a true blue egger she is a mix of ameraucana and buff orpington her eggs waver,sometimes sage green sometimes a blue nearly indistinguishable from my ameraucana. One time and one time only she laid a blank. Had to be her I've got no white egg layers at all.

 

[aart]

Not likely but true. She is not a true blue egger she is a mix of ameraucana and buff orpington her eggs waver,sometimes sage green sometimes a blue nearly indistinguishable from my ameraucana. One time and one time only she laid a blank. Had to be her I've got no white egg layers at all.

But you probably have a brown layer that 'ran out of paint'.

There are only blue and white shells, that do not change color.
What can change is the brown coating,
making white shells brown and blue shells green to varying degrees.

 

[junebuggena]

Not likely but true. She is not a true blue egger she is a mix of ameraucana and buff orpington her eggs waver,sometimes sage green sometimes a blue nearly indistinguishable from my ameraucana. One time and one time only she laid a blank. Had to be her I've got no white egg layers at all.

There are only two genes for shell color, blue or white. And blue is always dominant over white. Brown eggs are produced by a coating applied over a white shell. Green eggs are that same coating applied over a blue shell.
The white egg came from a brown layer that laid the egg before the brown coating could be applied. It is not possible for a blue/green layer to produce a white egg.

 

[Ravynscroft]

Acutally, a white egg is possible from a blue egg layer... just as a darker blue can happen as well... yes, the pigment is inside the shell itself, but I have seen where it didn't get evenly distributed and was darker at one end and lighter at the other... I've also gotten an extremely pale egg I could have sworn was white, but with very close inspection it had just a bare hint of blue...

Just as brown egg layers can run out of paint, or have 'malfunctions' in the coating amounts, so can blue egg layers have pigment mixture issues...