Egg Shells

[niemeyjt]

I know there are some fowl people on here, so here goes with a question that sprang to mind while making scrambled eggs this morning.

The latest box of eggs from the Co-op was brown shelled - and cracked cleanly. Previously white shelled eggs, of the same category, would splinter on cracking and I had to fish out small pieces of shell from the mix.

So - white vs brown shells.

Is it down to the individual hens? the breed? the food? can an individual chicken lay both?

[Spectrum]

From what I can remember, POY lay brown eggs, white hens lay white eggs, then you have a vast assortment of breeds that lay differant coloured and patterned eggs. But its a long time since we kept chickens and turkeys.

[Polarengineer]

When I had true Maran chickens they layed chocolate (colour) eggs and my vorwerk chickens had cream (colour) eggs, I was trying to get creme eggs. Back to the OP. I found that if the chooks were given oyster shells (available at Gamme vert) they would always have strong eggshells, so I think it depends on how they are fed.

[Char]

White vs Brown shells depends on the type of chicken. My brown and my Black chickens lay brown eggs and my white chickens lay white eggs.

Strength of shell depends on food as mentioned above, I give mine oyster shells, this helps them break the food down and also gives them extra calcium which makes the egg shells stronger.

[elsie]

some extracts from https://www.independent.co.uk/life-styl ... 31716.html
Up until the 1970s white eggs were popular in the UK, however shoppers began switching to the brown variety under the misconception that they are more “rustic” or “natural".

“The move (to white eggs) could also have a massive agricultural benefit as white hens are more docile than brown ones and lay eggs for longer and more reliably too.”

Earlier this year, The British Free Range Egg Producers Association also urged consumers to buy white eggs in a bid to help reduce animal cruelty.
This is because the farming of brown eggs requires hens to have their beaks trimmed with an infrared laser beam, which it is argued causes high levels of distress to the birds.
The British Hen Welfare Trust states that it is common practice to trim just the tip of the beak in the UK and is carried out ultimately to protect birds from hurting each other.
Unlike hens which lay brown eggs, white birds are said to be less aggressive.

[MAD87]

I used to feed oyster shells and grit to my hens and they produced big brown eggs, often double yolked. We had 2 cockerels, one a Black Orrpinton (Othello) who was a gift and a real softie, tother was an anxious white fella (Macbeth) with few social skills and only one wife. They slept together in a plum tree and she hid her white eggs in inaccessible corners of the barn.

[Spectrum]

We had six POL and three Anaconda bantams, one of which was the cock, very aggressive with all the hens, and us, coming home from a rare night at the local, the DW showed us our five year old daughters leg, it was a mess were the cock had attacked her. I got a spade grabbed the bas**** and killed it, I buried it under the grape vine, my grandad used to do do that with the odd dead cat you get good grapes though