New and confused by frequency and color

Hi! I only have one Ameraucana or Easter Egger, but she lays the greenish eggs. The Easter Eggers can lay any different color eggs, including the brown one you saw, green, pink, blue or buff. My chickens laid their eggs all over the place until I put an artificial egg in the nest box. Believe it or not, they actually studied the fake egg and then after that the eggs all have ended up in the boxes. I would think that at this time you have 3 laying and the others will start up soon. As they begin they do have off days and such. My EE is currently laying in that afternoon as well. Good luck and have fun with your different color eggs! Hope this is helpful!

 

It sounds like you have three hens laying but there's really no way to tell for sure without putting a camera in the nesting boxes! (which I have been known to want to do but haven't had the nerve just yet!) As far as the color goes, I don't think a green egg layer would lay a brown egg, although my EE who lays green eggs normally has layed three blue eggs at different times. (I know it's her because she is the only EE I have) EE's can lay a variety of colors depending on what the mix breed is. I have heard of brown, blue, pink and varying shades of green.

As far as how often they will lay, each bird will have a different lay "schedule" and in the beginning it is impossible to say what that schedule will turn out to be. My EE (Easter Egger, this is what you really got from the feed store as feed stores generally don't sell true bred Ameraucanas) only lays an average of 4 or 5 eggs per week. Others on this forum have said their EE's lay every day. Also my experience was that once one of my girls started laying, they were all laying within a few weeks. So every day or so was another first egg day! (I knew this because all of my girls are different breeds and lay different eggs!)

As far as getting them to lay in the nesting boxes, you could put some fake eggs in the boxes for them to see and this might make them think it is a "good" place to lay. Whenever I noticed behaviour in one of my hens that looked like they might be getting ready to lay, redder comb, walking around making loud noises like something was about to happen but they weren't quite sure what, that sort of thing, I would go out and make a "nest" shape in the box and put them in it and talk to them softly, just to give them the idea that this was a good place if indeed they were getting ready to lay.

Hopefully some of this will help you. With chickens it's a kind of learn as you go kind of thing and not all things work for everyone. Welome to the world of chickens and welcome to the forum! It is a treasure trove of information and good people!



CJ

 

Your chickens won't change egg colors , so if you got 3 blue or green eggs in 1 day, & a brown egg within 24 hours, you have 4 hens laying.

I might add ...they can change tints, but won't change from blue to brown & back.