What’s the obsession over egg shell color?

[cmom]

A brown egg. Please excuse the blurriness. I was trying to hold the egg and the camera at the same time for video. Not easy.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

My EE hen was a hood producer when she still laid. Around 4 or 5 eggs a week.

As a kid, I loved brown eggs. Thought they were better than the white ones and didn't eat the white ones. Even now, I kinda prefer to not eat my white eggs. Not sure why, probably just something left over from then.

 

[Annalyse]

I have a hen that lays green eggs. My customers have kids and even teenagers and I guess its because it keeps them entertained for breakfast. They love them.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

So now my flock either has birds that lay colors other than whire, or birds that lay white but i love their appearance enough for those white eggs

 

[OhZark Biddies]

So yes or no? Are your color-egg layers good producers?

our colored egg layers lay pretty much the same as our brown egg layers... but we have no white egg layers simply because the Mediterranean breeds tend towards flightiness and don’t work well for our setup.... and some of the more docile white egg layers like polish aren’t known to be good layers... but I wouldn’t mind some white eggs if I could find the right breed

But I also stay away from real heavy laying brown egg laying breeds such as the hybrid sex link layers, in part because they seem to have more reproductive problems.

so while I’m definitely not comparing our birds with high production layers of white or brown eggs, as a rule of thumb all our layers lay about the same regardless of color... broodiness and age being the biggest factors

 

[JacinLarkwell]

You

our colored egg layers lay pretty much the same as our brown egg layers... but we have no white egg layers simply because the Mediterranean breeds tend towards flightiness and don’t work well for our setup.... and some of the more docile white egg layers like polish aren’t known to be good layers... but I wouldn’t mind some white eggs if I could find the right breed

But I also stay away from real heavy laying brown egg laying breeds such as the hybrid sex link layers, in part because they seem to have more reproductive problems.

so while I’m definitely not comparing our birds with high production layers of white or brown eggs, as a rule all our layers lay about the same regardless of color... broodiness and age being the biggest factors

You might like spitzhauben. They lay white eggs and I think would be less skittish if I handles them more. Not flighty though, just good runners

 

[U_Stormcrow]

My best layers, hands down, are my Golden Comets, a variety of red sex link from Hoover's, by way of TSC - but obviously, that's a hybrid, not a breed, "built" with egg laying in mind, and only egg laying in mind.

Brown eggs. 3 days out of 4. Eggs are quite large relative to the size of the bird.

/edit and as @OhZark Biddies hinted at above, the Comets burn the proverbial candle at both ends. They are like they layer equivalent of CornishX, not famed for longevity. I bought them specifically to get egg production ASAP last summer, with the plan to replace them over the course of this coming year as they head into fall/winter molt. Some of their eggs (Mutt x Comet, obviously) are in the incubator right now - what results will obviously be mutt, but the Comet parentage has some useful genetics, so I'm rolling the dice. Many, many times over the coming months.

 

[JacinLarkwell]

I love my calico princess. However, I have to remember she may not last too long (not a year yet and every egg has giant meat spots). But I'm getting more next spring. She's big, super friendly and and calm. I can come in and just scoop her up when I want to

 

[JCaseyHammond]

...don’t they all taste the same?

growing up...i am 41...we always had brown eggs and that was “weird” to my friends. they would question eating an egg that had a brown shell...now it’s common place in the grocery store as if it’s better than a white egg.

What’s the obsession over egg shell color?

Variety and color add joy to life. There’s a real sense of achievement to be had from studying genetics (thanks, BYC members!) when crossing different breeds, then getting to see a new color egg shell from the first egg from a chicken I created. When I give people my extra eggs, I do explain that the color of the shell is just pretty packaging, and that the important color is the dark yellow of the yolk from nutrients in the pasture grass my chickens graze on. I keep my hens even when they quit laying, and just bought store eggs for the first time in 4 years. Store eggs taste less “eggy” to me.

 

[JCaseyHammond]

That is what I figure. It has to be something in their feed.

Whatever it is it is very unpleasant to be in extreme pain from eating a stupid egg.

I can imagine your pain. In my case it was allergy to duck protein. A friend gave me a dozen duck eggs. The first two were delicious but caused digestive pain like you described. The irony is I adopted some homeless ducks and now raise and sell Muscovy because other people need them.