THE D1BHVX Kim t>7 



CHAPTER VII. 



THE BROWN EGG. 



The brown egg. Origin of the brown-egg fad. What the trap nest says. 

 The size of the egg. The terms "litter" and "clutch" defined. 



jERHAl'S 1 can do no butter than to begin this subject by repro- 

 ducing an article that 1 contributed to the Eastern Poultryman 

 lasl year. 



THE ORIGIN OF THE BROWN EGG FAD. 



(Written for the Eastern Poultryman.) 



While the white shelled egg is still preferred in some sections the brown 

 shelled egg is ultra-fashionable in New England and throughout the 

 greater part of the country. 



Perfectly fresh eggs, laid by healthy hens that are fed the same kinds 

 of food will taste precisely the same be their shells white or brown. 



The brown shelled eggs are laid by hens that secrete coloring matter or 

 pigment in that portion of the oviduct where the shell is completed. 



Hens whose animal economy does not furnish this colored pigment lay 

 white shelled eggs. 



Let us examine a chocolate colored shell laid by a Plymouth Rock of a 

 "brown egg strain." We find that the color does not permeate the entile 

 shell. The inner membrane that first encloses the egg before the shell 

 is formed is white; the structure of the shell itself is white; the outer 

 surface of the shell only is brown. It is merely a surface tint from the 

 brush of the artist Nature serving to distinguish one family from another. 

 Who can say that birds in their wild state are not guided and aided in 

 the protection of their species by the color of their eggs? 



It is said that the color of the flower serves to point out to the bees the 

 place where honey is to be found and the bee in turn carries the life- 

 giving pollen to other flowers. 



The brown color of the egg shell being confined to the outer surface 

 cannot effect the flavor of the egg; but there can be no doubt that many 

 people have had, and do have the idea that brown shelled eggs are better 

 than white shelled eggs. There is a reason for everything and there must 

 be a reason for this. Brown shelled eggs formerly denoted that the hens 

 that produced them were Asiatics or had Asiatic blood. The Asiatic 

 breeds lay large eggs. Is it not true that years ago when the "brown egg 

 fad" began to be noticed that the brown shelled eggs in our city markets 

 were generallv larger than those having white shells? If so, the people 

 would naturally prefer them. 



But there was another condition twenty-five or thirty years ago that it 

 seems reasonable to suppose might have had a tendency to bring the 

 white egg into discredit and thus boom the brown egg. That was the 



