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Fancy chicken breeds and their colourful eggs

​Before we started keeping backyard chickens we were highly excited about the different coloured eggs that different fancy breeds of hens would lay. We thought that it would be amazing to have 6 hens, and have each one lay a different colour egg - so our ½ doz  box a day would look so pretty and colourful. 

We turned to the internet to find out which fancy hens would give us a wide range of egg colours, shortlisted 6 varieties that would lay us a rainbow omelette, and trundled off to a remote mountain in Wales to meet with a specialist breeder.  

Sure enough, the breeder had the hens we were looking for, plus many many more varieties to choose from - such variation, such potential to have different coloured eggs! We were overjoyed!

The varieties of hen we chose were:
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Warren chickens
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However, we soon learned that egg colour makes absolutely no difference to the taste of the egg. After you have collected eggs day in, day out for a few weeks the novelty of varying egg shell colour wears off.

Over time, we noticed the fancies would lay a pretty egg every so often - but not nearly as many eggs as we had hoped for and nowhere nearly as often as those brown hens that our neighbours had. 

Although all hens lived in peace and harmony, we noticed that they were highly susceptible to mites and prone to dropping dead with no identifiable reason which made us, novice chicken keepers at the time, very sad. They were well looked after and protected from the predators so we can only put this down to either weak genetics (who knows what ingenuity it takes to create a fancy breed), or the fancy breeds just not being hardy enough to survive.  

Since having our fancy breeds, we have gained more residents for the hen house - this time, we have opted for the humble warren, the standard commercial brown battery layer.  The warren never fails to disappoint, we have been having an egg a day constantly (apart from last month when they all went on strike for a week), we have seen no sign of mites and they are all super healthy! 

So, does the colour of an egg matter?  My view is that an egg is an egg, and the warren really is a hardy egg production machine, suitable for any British homestead! 

What are you experiences of keeping chickens?
Do you have any questions about keeping chickens?
Leave us a comment below!

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  • Home
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
  • Wine List & Recipes
    • Banana Wine Made Simple
    • Blaand
    • Blackberry Mead
    • Christmas Pudding Wine!
    • Easy Rhubarb Wine
    • Gorse Flower Wine
    • Gutsy Ginger Wine
    • Liquorice Wine
    • Mead Making Made Simple
    • Mint Wine Recipe
    • Mushroom Wine
    • Nasturtium Leaf Wine
    • No Boil Rhubarb Wine
    • Pine Needle Wine
    • Pumpkin Wine
    • Rose Hip Leaf Wine
    • Red Kidney Bean Wine!
    • Rose Petal Wine
    • Seaweed Wine
    • Spiced banana wine
    • Turnip and Red Cabbage Wine
    • Wine Making 101
    • What is a country wine?
    • ​Can I use bread yeast to make wine?
  • Homestead
    • Dee's Corner >
      • Military wife blog
      • First Time Pregnant
    • Projects >
      • SmallholdersUK
      • Beard Award
      • #Eday on Twitter
    • Recipes >
      • Homemade Cheese
      • Pickled Quail Eggs
      • Simple Bread Loaf
      • Banana Ice-Cream
      • Rhubarb Chutney (Old)
      • Making Sea Salt on the Log Fire
      • Shepherds pie for the dogs
    • Our Island >
      • Homestead or Smallholding
      • 18 days until we move!
      • 10 days until we move
      • 2 Days to go!
      • We are here!
      • Waterworks!
      • Location is not the answer
      • Remote Living Challenges
      • The Caves
      • Reason to waggle (caves)
      • Sea Fishing in Eday
    • Duck >
      • Duck shed
      • Duck 1: Incubation
      • Duck 2: Imprinting
      • Duck 3: Outdoors
      • Duck 4: Attached
    • Quail >
      • Quail 1: Reasons
      • Quail 2: Incubation
      • Quail 3: Brooding
      • Quail 4: Raising
      • Quail 5: Suicidal
      • Quail 6: Permaculture
      • Quail 7: Environment
      • Quail 8: Setup
    • Chickens >
      • Chickens Fancy vs Warren
      • Ebay Eggs
      • Our Egg Hatching Plan
      • Nursing Chickens 1 - 2018
      • Brooding Chickens 1 - 2018
      • Hatching Chickens 1 - 2018
    • Home & Garden >
      • Baby Starling
      • Spider Plants
      • Aloe Vera
      • Fuel for winter
      • Peat, Coal, Wood
      • Hoarding Supplies
      • Coffee grounds
      • Brewers Hops
      • Brewers grain
      • Teabag compost
      • Essential oils
      • Eco Toothbrush
      • No Fridge?
    • Other articles >
      • The best and the worst of dog food!
      • Random acts of kindness
      • Bristol No Foraging
      • Philosophy on Raising Children
      • Close encounter with Bulls
      • Blog