Last summer Sparkle was my best layer. She laid four or five eggs per week throughout the summer and was last to stop laying and begin her moult. Sparkle’s eggs were the smallest of all the girls. They were the same pale colour as the other girl’s eggs but were narrower and had the least white inside them.
Since she has started laying again this year her eggs are bigger in size (more white inside them) and darker in shell colour. They are a very light brown or perhaps beige. I wonder if this change will be ongoing and is because she is more mature or is it because she has just started laying again. She is only laying one egg in nearly two weeks at the moment so I wonder if it is being held longer at the stage when the pigment goes on.
Only time will tell if her eggs return to how they were last year (but perhaps with an increase in size) or if they will stay like this. I quite like the difference in colour as it makes it easy to tell which are her eggs. Last summer I could tell her eggs by their narrow shape.
I thought I should record this so I can compare later when she hits her stride in the summer.
Sparkle’s egg on the right
The egg on the left is a medium sized shop bought egg, next is Topaz’s egg followed by Barley’s egg laid yesterday and on the right is Sparkle’s egg laid yesterday. Sparkle’s eggs used to be as pale in colour but narrower than Topaz’s eggs and are now slightly bigger and darker. I find this quite fascinating. It will be interesting to see how this progresses.
Of course to most people this doesn’t matter in the slightest, but as us chicken keepers know, all egg laying changes are a source of fascination.
Click here to see the history of my flock.
I was interested in the fact that the shop brought egg is a medium size and Bantum eggs are usually tiny compared to large chickens and yours look similar .
Which makes you wonder what type of chicken lays the shop eggs.
I know that my chickens eggs are far bigger than the large shop eggs which thankfully I don’t usually need to buy… There is no comparison .
If a chicken is in a cage or barn in the dark are their eggs normally smaller?
I only ever buy free range eggs even though I really don’t like to buy them at all but have only been getting two eggs a week from the girls. I also always buy medium free range but you are quite right they are not as big as my big girls used to lay. I think they should probably be classed as small really but the shops only seem to class them as either medium or large. I would say they are small because as you say they are not much bigger than my bantam eggs.
It’s odd, and I have had the same thing with two of mine: Grayzie who, for the past two seasons had laid a matt-finish cream/tinted egg, is now producing a light brown – no mistaking her long, pointed egg, but the colour is definitely darker this season. Galaxy, my pekin, is the same – virtually identical in colour both last year and now this year to Grayzie’s, but smaller. I think you might be right about the pigment gland: my welsummer, Cate, now going into her 4th season is laying less than in the past – every 2 to 3 days only, but her egg colour is much darker again, having paled hugely towards the end of last season.
This is very strange and interesting. With Sparkle I wasn’t sure if it was just because she had just started laying again but after three eggs it seems that they have changed in size and colour. I will continue to watch but as you have similar experience I wonder if they do indeed change slightly in colour.