What is wrong with my eggs?

[Millymollymandy]

I was making a cake yesterday and I broke a couple of duck eggs in a bowl and ......... yeuch! The yolks were a horrible khaki green colour! Tried some more fresher eggs, same thing. Tried the ones laid that day, same thing!

The yolks didn't smell when broken but just look disgusting. The ducks seem perfectly well and haven't changed their diet.

Any ideas? I have no hen eggs at the moment either so we had to go out and buy some - the shame!

[Jack]

Gidday

Did the duck eggs come from a khaki Campbell?

[Millymollymandy]

ha ha ha!

[Stonehead]

I tried Chinese preserved duck eggs once. Never again. The whites turn black, the yolks turn green and the whole egg is sort of jellified. The flavour is like very bad, very strong cheese and the smell, phew!

Perhaps your ducks are Chinese?

More seriously, your problem could be bacterial. There is a type of bacteria that can turn eggs green and give them a sour smell. I'm not sure if it affects the yolks, the whites or both though.

Anther possibility is that the ducks have been eating shepherd's purse, as this can dye the yolks green.

[Chickenlady]

I was going to suggest something they might have eaten as well. After all, if I feed my hens a lot of corn, it makes their yolks very yellow, so it makes sense.

I do not like green eggs and ham!

[Millymollymandy]

I hadn't thought to Google but it is hard to trawl through all the blurb containing Dr Seuss, those preserved chinese eggs and hard boiled eggs with a green tinge!

I've googled Shepherds Purse, and whilst I may have seen it here, it certainly isn't one of my common weeds that I recognise straight away.

The ducks laid 3 eggs this morning, so I'll be cracking them all to see. Yesterday I had one green one and one that was yellow-but-not-quite-right.

Just found that the plant Pennycress can cause green yolks too. Whilst I don't think I recognise that either, what I do have a lot of on the beach area by the pond, where the ducks spend a lot of time, is hairy bittercress which has very similar flowers and sounds like it is from the same family. I wonder if it has the same effect on the eggs?

[Millymollymandy]

No sign of either of those plants on my land and out of 3 eggs, 2 were green and one was an iffy yellow.

I guess it will remain a mystery. Hopefully whatever they are eating will die off when it gets really cold. I hope!

[possum]

doing a google, eating acorns is another possibility

[Millymollymandy]

I didn't come across that when googling (in fact there is very little info out there once you sift through the dross).

Acorns we have everywhere!

Off to google some more, thanks Possum!

[Millymollymandy]

Acorns it is then, which may or may not be fatal, a debatable subject it seems - well for hens anyway, not sure about ducks.

Interesting discussion on Practical Poultry forum for anyone else who comes across green yolks!

http://kelseyinfo.co.uk/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1124888096

[Millymollymandy]

Out of 13 eggs, 3 were OK. Little buggers are still eating them!

[Millymollymandy]

Just wanted to mention that I have not had this problem this year, due to the fact that there have been hardly any acorns at all. Well in fact I found 2 - and I have about 25 oak trees on my land! Same probs as plums etc I guess. I do feel sorry for the jays.