Green Shell Eggs?

[bustermommy]

Congrats! Your duck is not a drake! And she's laying! None of those hens looks like an EE either. I could only see standard combs. I don't think you'll get green eggs from them.


Pic of a mallard drake. Not mine!

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[zzGypsy]

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If they are from Zigs, that would be so funny, as I was just talking with one of friends last week about whether or not she'd lay. She's very small. I wouldn't imagine her eggs being large. She's half the size of my hens, and like a flea sized to my Roos! LOL

I'm relieved that the shell color is not a sign of distress or illness. That's what I was most worried about.

Thank you to everyone for your assistance! I will keep watching posts and see what others say as well! I think the Jury is still out and whether or not it's Ziggy (duck) or Dolly (maybe not an RIR after all!)

true mallards ARE very small - about half the size of a pekin (the white ducks you see at parks).
sometimes what folks have are rouens, which are the same color pattern as mallards but the size of domestic ducks. rouens generally lay egg that are larger than XL chicken eggs (once they get in full-on production) and are typically white to palest hint of pink. I've sometimes seen rouens up for sale as mallards, so I think sometimes folks don't always know the difference.

 

[Pele]

What a fun egg mystery!

I vote that your green egg is coming from the duck as well. None of your chickens have a pea comb (very commonly linked to the green/blue egg gene), or are green layers.

A really easy way to settle the mystery is to break the egg. Duck eggs are a lot thicker and have thicker membranes than chicken eggs. If you practically have to use a jackhammer to get into it, it's a duck egg. If it cracks when you tap it gently on a pan, it's a chicken egg.

 

[PaulaJoAnne]

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Its also waxy on the outside

 

[Whispering_Raven]

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Are you sure that a single chicken is laying 2-3 eggs per day?

Positive! Sunshine and Diva were both laying 2-3 each per DAY. Operating an organic farm, I feed them my own mix of organic grains plus they are free range (except at night of course) They get lots of hoppers and crickets and they LOVED the Japanese Beetles that were eating my roses in the late Spring. This winter they will have their own plot of buckwheat, winter wheat, winter oats and crimson clover. Now that Fall has officially set in and they have a nice full nest of eggs that I chose not to collect, they have slowed down to about 1 each per day. Sometimes none, but on average I get one from each.

Rosey has her own nest and would lay an egg a day and I haven't seen Dolly lay one egg yet.

 

[gryeyes]

Those are duck eggs. Congratulations!

And Dolly is not an EE mix; she doesn't have the pea comb. She most likely IS laying, though, because it takes approximately 26 hours for a chicken to build an egg. It is very rare for chickens to lay more than one egg a day unless one of them is incomplete, soft shelled, no shell, etc. They start, say at 10 a.m., perhaps, the next day lay around noon, the next day around 2 p.m., etc until it's too late to lay, and that day is skipped. Then the cycle begins anew, with the last egg held over until the morning.

 

[Whispering_Raven]

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I did not know that! I shall try it! The egg itself does feel a bit "heavier" than the other eggs, if that makes any sense. I'll do a float test first, but these were just laid over the last day or two. I'm pretty good about checking the coop all around to see if one of ladies changed places. I'll let you know! Not sure about the waxy feel. I'll have to check that out too.

 

[zzGypsy]

Quote:
I did not know that! I shall try it! The egg itself does feel a bit "heavier" than the other eggs, if that makes any sense. I'll do a float test first, but these were just laid over the last day or two. I'm pretty good about checking the coop all around to see if one of ladies changed places. I'll let you know! Not sure about the waxy feel. I'll have to check that out too.

I don't notice that my duck eggs feel waxy when dry, however, they do get quite a bit more slick when wet than my chicken eggs seem to. heavier - yes, I think that's true of my duck eggs. yolk may be larger relative to the white as well.
and they are like concrete to crack.

 

[Chicky-dees]

Ziggy is a Ziggette!!

 

[sparkles2307]

My Rouen ducks lay white eggs and my Rouen/Saxony crosses lay green eggs.