Welsummer or Cuckoo Maran

[Shaelyn Hill]

So I haven’t gotten a light tan egg like the one on the left since that original photo I’ve posted. I’m now getting too brown speckled eggs so even further from guessing who is who. I haven’t caught anyone in the act yet and laying has been more sparse since it’s been so cold.

One of the eggs is always covered in a white powdery like substance. I’ve read this could be too much calcium? That’s the only way I can tell them apart.

 

[driver]

I've gotten two eggs from a new layer in my coop - either the cuckoo maran or the black australorp (hopefully not the easter egger). The eggs aren't really any darker than my standard brown Golden Comet's eggs, but they have a fair amount of dark speckles. One thing I do notice is that they are less pointy than the eggs from my other two layers. It looks like your darker eggs are also less pointy than the chalky eggs. Is that common for cuckoo marans?

 

[member 373180]

Those two could've come straight out of my egg basket, including the shiny vs. chalky appearance. Top welsummer, bottom cuckoo marans. I'm really curious if you'll find the same as I've been wondering about the differences in shininess too.

 

[Ridgerunner]

As you can tell by the posts above the color of the shell has little to do with breed but has a lot to do with breeding. If the person that selects the chickens that get to breed uses dark egg shells as a criteria then you will get hens that lay darker eggs. If they do not limit hatching to only hatching darker eggs you can get hens that lay fairly light eggs. Some people like to think that every chicken of a certain breed is identical all over the world but it just doesn’t work that way. They are all individuals and if you want to enhance a certain trait you need to breed for that trait. A lot of people don’t.

That looks like an egg with extra calcium. If it is a rare occurrence, well we are all allowed an “oops” every now and then. If it is a regular occurrence then it probably means she has a defective shell gland. Normally after a hen finishes putting the shell material on the egg she stops depositing shell material and uses the last half hour or so in the shell gland to put a coating of brown on the egg. Putting that brown coating on is one of the last steps before she lays it. For whatever reason the hen does not stop depositing calcium when she puts that brown on. It does not hurt the egg, it is fine to eat.

I think yours are still pullets. Sometimes it takes a while for a pullet to get all the kinks out of her internal egg making factory. It’s a pretty complicated system, sometimes I think it’s amazing how many get it right from the start. It’s possible she will correct that calcium deposit thing pretty soon or it may go on forever.

Something else. Expect the eggs to get lighter in shade the longer they lay. That typically happens with pullets when they start laying or hens right after a molt. When they first start they lay the darkest eggs they will lay. Gradually through the egg laying cycle the shells get lighter. Then they molt and start laying really dark eggs again after they have refreshed their bodies.