White egg yolk

[Hog]

Hi can anyone tell me why I get a White egg yolk ,I get them quite often I feed then all sorts veg as well as layer pellets ,mealworm and handful of corn in the evenings. i have had chicken in the past but never had a White yolk with them is there a reason for this

 

[chrismahon]

Hi Hog. That's quite unusual as we had egg yolks once that were as light as you describe, but we were experimenting. Most layers feeds have in them what are called 'yolk enhancers'- a fancy name for the 3 permitted chemical colourants. We were feeding them without those chemicals. Organic or chemical free feeds use maize and grass (and something else -a flower I think) for the yolk colouring. So one of your hens isn't eating the required feedstuff to colour the yolk. You will find cabbage (savoy we used) will get you golden yolks. Check the contents of your layers pellets Hog.

 

[foxy]

When you say "white" is there a distinction between the white and the yolk of the egg? Or does the egg just consist of the white without a yolk?

 

[Hog]

There is a yolk but its really pale it's more white then yellow .I have been using the same layers pellets for a good few years now .but just recently we have got some new chickens and this time I got a few different variety .

 

[Marigold]

Do you think all the birds lay very pale yolks sometimes, or is it just one or two?
If its all of them, this could point to a nutritional deficiency, but if just one or two, the basic food is probably OK and there is something wrong with hens concerned. The usual advice for getting a good coloured yolk is to feed dark coloured greens, such as cabbage as Chris says, (not lettuce which is nutritionally pretty useless, although they like it) and also as much free ranging as possible where they can eat short grass and find a variety of other plants. Good quality pellets often contain marigold petals as a yolk enhancer, which is also excellent. You might also try a broad-spectrum tonic, preferably one which includes seaweed.

 

[Hog]

I think it's only one as I have got two White chicken which lay White eggs and they seem to be ok nice and yellow .

 

[grampazipperneck]

I also have very light yokes with all the hens we have now. With past flocks we always had dark yokes. Along with the light yokes we are having more misshapen eggs and the yokes break very easily when cooking. We've tried different feeds with no changes. Production has always been okay, 12 to 18 eggs per day for 19 hens with a little less in the winter. The breeds are Barred Rock, Buff Orpington and Rode Island Red.