Feathered Friday: A Rainbow of Eggs

Aside from Boo-boo, our other egg layers right now are what they call Easter Eggers.  These chickens can lay a multitude of egg colors from brown, to green, to blue or pink.  

Here is our array of colors.

Photo courtesy of Sandy James
at So What? I Run.

These were my first gift of eggs to a friend.  She is very health and fitness conscious, so it was a joy to give them and receive such a beautiful thank you photo.

It's delightful to walk into the coop and see a rainbow of eggs waiting for me.

When I first got the Easter Eggers, I was under the impression that they would all lay blue eggs.  But as you can see, we get blue, green, and even pink eggs.  The rainbow of colors is from cross breeding hens and roosters of breeds that lay different colored eggs.  For instance, a rooster from a brown egg breed (i.e. Buff Orpington) bred to a blue egg laying hen (i.e. Ameraucana) could produce a hen that lays green eggs.  The possibilities abound.

When the day came that I collected five eggs, one from each hen of laying age, I was able to tell that we had two blue egg layers, one green egg layer, one pink egg layer, and of course Boo-boo's brown eggs.  Now I had to figure out who was laying what color.  

A hen will always lay the same color egg, so it just became a mater of catching each girl in the act.  (I did hear of putting lipstick around the vent of the hen so that the egg would be marked when it came out, but I find that gross.)  There is plenty of time.  I can wait.

A few days ago, I caught Gate Locker in a nesting box.

This isn't necessarily her egg
as there were 2 in the box this time.

I kept checking on her until she was out and there was an egg in the nesting material.  The one egg left behind, still hot from the warmth of her body, was green.  So, Gate Locker is our green egg layer.

Gate Locker's Green Egg

A couple days later I caught Gracie in a nesting box.

Beautiful Gracie in the nesting box.

A little while later, I found a blue egg where she had been.  I also noted that it has the distinctive long shape that I've been finding double yolks in.  (I've had three double yolks already!)

Gracie's Blue Egg

Now I just need to figure out either who lays the other blue eggs or who lays the pink eggs, and I'll know which Easter Egger girl lays what color.  


Do you have a favorite egg color?