Speckled Eggs?

[nes]

We just moved into our new house, and it came with two lovely egg-laying ladies!

Unfortunately their coop was in quite the state (to put it mildly...) so after a 4 hour clean-up and repair we now have two very happy chickens.

We've only been here a few days and so far Henny has given us an egg every day, Penny only laid for the first time yesterday after the coop was cleaned.
(When I say first time, their run is very overgrown as well, so it was the first time she'd lain in her nest box).

Penny's egg has little off-white flecks on it.
Is this normal?
Or does it indicate something could be wrong?

They are both quite healthy looking, and now very happy to have poop-free nest boxes.

As a side question - I did notice one of them poop (I think it was penny) in one of the boxes they don't use. There at 10 boxes and 2 chickens, and they both have their favourite box. Should I close up the others until we get more chickens?
Is there another way to keep her from pooping in there?
(It may have been because we also removed their roosting area because of too much of a build up - we're replacing it with a new one today).

I'm not sure what breed Henny or Penny are, I'll get pictures to post when it stops raining.

Thanks!

 

[raro]

I'm not sure, but my eggs are frequently "freckled" with tiny spots. It seems to just be a normal occurence. Do you know what kind of hens they are?

As to pooping, if you close up the extra boxes they will find another place to poop. Chickens don't seem to be concerned about "marking" their spaces with poop like dogs and cats! And they don't show their displeasure by pooping in forbidden places, either.

Good for you for making their lives better!

 

[nes]

They aren't spotted like two-tones, it's a hard deposit on the outside of the eggs.

I would get a picture of the egg but someone was moving the fridges last night and put my eggs into the freezer

. So they are in the garbage...

I should add, I don't know what they are eating.

They were left with feed that I'm going to assume is a layer ration (there are DOZENS of feed bags in the coop so no way to know which one was most recent). It has corn and what looks like sweet-feed in it.
I'm letting them out in their pen now (again super over-grown) so I don't know if they have been getting much of anything out there, they're getting kitchen scraps.

So this could potentially be a nutritional issue.

 

[nes]

Can anyone tell me what these lovely ladies are?
Looking through the directory I think they are plymouth


They must be getting more used to me! They usually don't let me get this close (or they just liked the camera...).
The roosts need to be replaced on those boxes on the back wall (we're going with a dowel instead of the 2x6s that were there, impossible to clean!!).
And I'm just waiting to find something for it to sit on to replace the bucket with the water-er.
And I'm trying to find some straw for the floor

.
So still some work to do...

And, does this look like layer ration?

 

[<3ChickenForever]

Looks to me that the left one is a light brahma and the other is a Barred rock. Pretty hens.

And sometimes my eggs are spotted, I'm pretty sure it's normal.

 

[AnaD]

The white one looks like a Delaware and the other looks like a Barred Rock (Good looking chickens!). That is a nice looking coop! With some sprucing and fixing it will be great. As for the feed, that looks like scratch to me and not layer feed, but if I'm wrong someone will surely correct me.
Edit: A little calcification on the outside of the eggs in the form of small flecks isn't unusual.

 

[alabamachick]

That appears to be scratch feed. You'll want to get some good layer feed to go along with it. Very pretty girls you have there! And your coop looks to be huge! PLENTY of space for some more babies! Be careful, chicken math is VERY dangerous!

 

[BuffaloWings]

I'm going to go with a Delaware and Barred Plymouth Rock. That looks like maybe some (very little) laying pellets with whole and cracked corn & other grains mixed in (scratch) mixed in. Sometimes when I look at the picture I see some pellet type stuff other times I just see grains. Consider the bad shape you found them in they both look great.

 

[Kbagwell1]

The one on the left isn't a light brahma...brahmas have feathered legs....I believe its a Delaware! The right is definately a Barred Rock.

 

[nes]

Oh my, I wanted to get more of the same breed because they seem so nice & hardy, so now I'm going to have to get more of both?

Thanks guys, feel much better about Penny then. She's very shy right now so I'm having a hard time getting a really good look at her, but we're spending lots of time together!

The coop is probably around 100 years old (that's how old the barn is) and was definitely built for more chickens

. We wanted to do some meat birds, but I think we're going to tractor them and maybe add just 2 or 3 more layers.