What color eggs is she supposed to lay?

[Chickenfeathers000]

Hi! So recently, my hens I hatched April last year have began to lay, and I've heard about the trick of telling what color eggs a hen lays by the color of her earlobe. This particular hen has white earlobes, but it doesn't make sense, because she can't lay white eggs, can she? Her father was either a F2 olive egger or a light brown layer, and her mother is a Dark Brahma. Even her sister lays brown eggs. So, is it just a coincidence she has white ear lobes? Here are some pictures of her:

Thank you!

 

[WingItRanch]

To me, it looks like her earlobes are actually red- just faded/stretched out a bit. In the closeup pic your provided, they look red with some fade.

 

[Chickenfeathers000]

Okay, thanks! But how would that happen?

 

[NatJ]

Hi! So recently, my hens I hatched April last year have began to lay, and I've heard about the trick of telling what color eggs a hen lays by the color of her earlobe. This particular hen has white earlobes, but it doesn't make sense, because she can't lay white eggs, can she? Her father was either a F2 olive egger or a light brown layer, and her mother is a Dark Brahma. Even her sister lays brown eggs. So, is it just a coincidence she has white ear lobes? Here are some pictures of her:
View attachment 4081949View attachment 4081950
Thank you!

The earlobe color is a coincidence.

If you are dealing with purebred chickens, you mostly do get a matching of white earlobes with white eggs and red earlobes with brown eggs, but that is because of what traits people decided to have in what breeds. And even among purebreds there are some exceptions (examples: Dorkings with red earlobes and white eggs, Penedesencas with white earlobes and brown eggs.)

If someone crosses breeds that have white earlobes and lay white eggs, of course the chicks tend to have white earlobes and lay white eggs. Or if someone crosses breeds that have red earlobes and lay brown eggs, of course the chicks tend to have red earlobes and lay brown eggs. So the association somewhat holds in mixed breed chickens because of what parents they often have.

If you mix chickens with white earlobes and ones with red, and white-layers with brown-layers, you can get all possible combinations of earlobe colors and egg colors in later generations.

In your case, given the ancestry of that chicken, I would expect her to lay either brown or green eggs. I would not expect her earlobe color to be any use in predicting the color of her eggs.

 

[fowltemptress]

The earlobe trick is a good way of predicting what egg a bird will lay because lobes and eggs coincidentally match in many breeds, but the two aren't linked.

Ha! NatJ explained it beautifully before I finished typing.

 

[ChookaPete]

@NatJ said it the best!

Yes - the earlobe - egg colour correlation only applies to purebred chickens. Any hybrid breed of chicken, that goes out the window!


Most of my hens are HyLine red sex link hybrid chickens, and despite all having red earlobes I get creamy coloured eggs, white eggs, brown eggs, pinkish-brown eggs, small eggs, huge eggs, spotted eggs...