Colorful Eggs

Easter is fast approaching and we've been busy coloring eggs.  This is the first year that we've colored brown eggs instead of white.  In the past, when all our eggs came from the store, I would buy the white ones for coloring because they take color the best or so I was lead to believe.  This year with an abundance of eggs there was no way that I was going to buy eggs. We would just have to see what happens when you try to color brown eggs.
Different chicken breeds lay different color eggs-white, brown and even blues and greens.  One thing I have learned while raising chickens is that even though you may have all of the same breed their eggs will not be exactly the same color.  Our chickens are black Australorps, except two, but all are brown egg layers.  We get several shades of brown, some dark, some light but most somewhere in the middle.  Of this variety we chose the lightest brown eggs to color.  Here you can see what they looked like before coloring-

 

 

They came out beautifully!   Orange took the longest to color.  As you can see from the picture above we placed some rubber bands on some.  Also you might notice that the egg is floating.  We blow out our eggs instead of hard boiling them so that we can keep that out on display.  But this also means that you have to keep turning the egg or push it down with a spoon so that it gets colored evenly. An interesting observation in blowing out the fresh eggs, I didn't crack one.  I always break at least one of the store bought eggs, usually more.  Now that I had plenty of eggs to spare not one little crack.  I believe it is because my hens have stronger shelled eggs.  I give them ground up oyster shells for extra calcium, plus they get to free range when the weather is nice and they get leftovers that include fruit, veggies and pasta.

The colors were more earth toned than we would have got with white eggs but we all love the way they turned out!