Powdery egg????

[7cutechix]

My pullets have only been laying about 3 weeks and so far they have been nice, smooth, brown eggs. Today and yesterday I got some not so smooth, powdery looking and feeling eggs. What would cause that??? They are ok to eat, right??

 

[chicklin]

that's odd. wat do you mean by a powdery feel. is it just soft and slick or something?

 

[Freckle Face Farm]

Every once and a while my birds throw a egg that looks to be dusted by powder its fine sometimes it is cause by stress..Like the lawn mower mine hate the mower..

I would'nt worry unless ya get 1 everyday...

 

[7cutechix]

That makes sense, they were locked out of the nest box and layed some eggs in the run...
The shell is not smooth, feels powdery....nothing comes off when rubbed, it just seems like it's missing the final coat of "paint" haha.

 

[Chotii]

No, I think you're right: it didn't get its last layer.

I have Cuckoo Maran hen that lays nice dark eggs (not dark like a Welsummer egg, but much darker than my Golden Sex Link's terra cotta colored egg). BUT it's clear that the last, darkest layer of color is applied just before the egg is laid, because it can be scratched off with a thumbnail. The moss in the nest often sticks to the wet egg, and when you pull the moss off, it takes the color with it.

Once we got a nearly-white egg from that same hen with a twisted, pinched narrow end. It had a goopy blob of colored...stuff...stuck at the pinched end. (I know it was the same hen, because we only have 3 hens, and had gotten a white and a terra cotta egg from the other two, that same day.) So, the color was clearly mis-applied to that egg somehow.

I have also gotten some 'dusty' looking eggs from that same hen. I'm convinced it's something wrong with her internal color-sprayer.

But this would also explain perhaps how she lays dark eggs with darker speckles - that's where the color is applied in extra layers.

 

[Tala]

I got a brown egg that was covered in a "dust" if you licked your finger and rubbed the "dust" would come off revealing regular old brown egg underneath.
So far just one was that way, but I heard of ppl on here having the same thing happen. It was only her 3rd egg if I remember correctly, so maybe a youngster thing? Her first egg wasn't solid brown either it looked spraypainted, but the rest have been solid colored.

 

[rainbowgardens]

One of my dominiques, the smallest of the bunch consistently lays a smaller, paler powdery egg. Has for months. If I had a roo, I wouldn't hatch any of her eggs.

 

[7cutechix]

Thanks for all your comments...who would have thought this stuff would interest me so much a year ago!! I'm pretty sure these eggs are from a brand new layer. I'll eat those...not put them in the cartons for sale...thanks!