[zoggett]

Hi there can anyone tell me if maran eggs are that dark brown colour as soon as they start laying? Not quite sure if bramble has started laying yet or if Marmalade is till doing all the hard work

Thanks
Debs

[joyfull]

The darkness depends on the strain of maran that you have - some can be fairly light but the best lay lovely dark ones 

[zoggett]

Thanks Joyfull will just have to wait until I get 2 in a day to be sure then 

Debs

[LittleRedHen]

Our Cuckoo Maran lays medium brown eggs.  Once in a while she'll lay a chocolate brown egg.  Right now she is off the lay as she is moulting.  Last year she started back up around March. 

[D]

When I went to Heckington show I ended up getting myself a Maran 'hen' because we wanted the chocolate eggs. A couple of weeks after we got it, it started to grow nice long tail feathers, now its started to crow and keep the hens in check. I can't see us getting any fancy coloured eggs now!

[CluckyChicken]

Well my cuckoo maran is now laying really light coloured brown eggs, but apparently they lay their darkest in the new year, when they come back into lay and the weather is warming up x

[gibbo]

I have read that the darker the egg the poorer the laying will be.  Maybe others have read or experienced this too.  However I have no experience in laying quality infact i am still waiting for my girls to lay their first eggs! They are around 27weeks now. A little egg would be a nice thankyou for all the care they have had!

[bluemaran]

Two eggs today off my cuckoo marans.Not dark brown yet but lovely eggs.Quite a good size too.May be the colour will darken in their second year,not sure.

[peter rooster]

Hi

Started off with mother cookoo maran and 8 chicks from Selby market £17.50  :)for the lot. Now down to mother hen and 2 chicks the others started to crow . The mothers eggs when she was laying were a light brown and one every day, now she has stopped. The chicks have not started to lay yet but I hope the eggs will be a dark brown. Ment to be getting 3 more point of lay marans off a friend but still waiting for delivery. If they do not arrive soon I will be after finding a maran breeder in the Scarborough area if anybody knows of one

[zoggett]

We got ours from Malton if thats any good to you?

Deb

[Mulberry1990]

I have a Cuckoo Maran, who lays very dark brown eggs! She's also a Scarborough birdy!
We got all three of ours from Hares Leap, they don't usually sell the chickens, but when I asked them about theirs they took me into one of the back barns where they had lots of chicks and said I could have as many as wanted for £5 each

[peter rooster]

Thank you for that I use to sell game to him I will go and see him sometime

[darkbrowneggs]

It is said that the prime factor in producing hens to lay dark colour egg is the cockerel, so to darken the eggs of any breed you should use a cockerel from a dark egg laying strain,  and in fact this is the origin of many of the modern hybrids which are being bred to lay the darker tinted eggs, such Speckeldys etc,

With Marans egg shell colour can be variable when they first come into lay, and it is best not to judge the quality of the bird until it has laid around 20 eggs after which time the colour should be fairly stable.

However with Marans the dark colour is "painted" on a white egg within the oviduct.  As a hen takes a miniumum of 25-26 hours  to produce an egg, generally  they lay a series of eggs, each slightly later in the day then after 3 or so eggs will take a day off, so the first egg laid after this will have spent longer in the oviduct so should be darker.

This is explained in greater depth  with other "Marans" hints and tips on Dark Brown Eggs.

All the best
Sue
Dark Brown Eggs

[peter rooster]

Thank you for that I will endevour to get a strain that lays darker eggs. Yours in the photo look very dark maybe I will oneday get some like that. Your number of eggs laid looks about what mother hen was doing, though in summer she did 20 days on the trot. As the night pulled in the eggs were laid latter in the day until the missed days.

[peter rooster]

Hi

Got the call three new girls arrive in the afternoon they are 12 months old so should lay that will bring me up to six marrans. Just want them to lay and everything will be perfect. Hope they soon sort out the pecking order and mum repmains top chicken