Ameraucanas, Araucanas or Easter Eggers............

What is the difference between these three breeds? They look all the same to me. My friend gave me a rooster and he looks like ameraucana, araucana and easter egger. How can you tell the difference?

Do a on site search - Differences Easter Egger, Ameraucana, Araucana - there are many in depth threads dealing with this subject.

Here is a really brief run down. Ameraucanas and aracaunas are real actual breeds. They have breed standards, and only certain colors of them are recognized. They have to adhere to a breed standard. Easter eggers are mixed breeds, not a real breed. Generally they lay green or blue eggs, but can also lay pink and brown, whereas the other two breeds should only lay blue to be considered true to their breeds. Aracaunas are also very distinctive because they are rumpless and have tufts. Ameraucanas and araucanas only come in certain colors while easter eggers, since not a true breed, can be any color at all. Here are some pictures to help you out:

These are wheaten ameraucanas:


This is an araucana:



Easter eggers can really be anything at all, so I won't post any pictures of them because there's really no standard. Pretty much any bird that lays blue or green eggs that doesn't meet any other breed standard is an easter egger.

To make things more confusing, hatcheries often label their easter eggers as Ameraucanas, americanas, araucanas, etc, and not easter eggers, while really they are not one of the above breeds.

X2 on Pyxis. There is a good article at http://www.the-chicken-chick.com/2011/09/ameraucana-easter-egger-or-araucana.html explaining the difference between Ameraucanas, Araucanas, and Easter Eggers. Most people who say they have Ameraucanas or Araucanas actually have Easter Eggers.

I got confused even more. Checked few hatcheries and they are selling Easter Eggers, or again Easter Eggers, or Ameraucanas (Araucanas) stating this is the same breed. After looking trough so many pictures, I know how Araucanas should look like. The problem is, I cannot tell difference between EE roosters and Ameraucana rooster because they look alike on every picture I found on inet.

Olekushka123 said:

I got confused even more. Checked few hatcheries and they are selling Easter Eggers, or again Easter Eggers, or Ameraucanas (Araucanas) stating this is the same breed. After looking trough so many pictures, I know how Araucanas should look like. The problem is, I cannot tell difference between EE roosters and Ameraucana rooster because they look alike on every picture I found on inet.

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True Ameraucana roosters always have slate blue legs. If the legs are any color other than slate blue, they are EEs. The only hatchery that I am aware of that sells true Ameraucanas is Meyer Hatchery, which sells Blue Ameraucanas. Meyer also sells EEs, but their Ameraucana chicks cost 5 times what their EE chicks cost. All of the other major hatcheries carry only Easter Eggers, even though they often label them Ameraucanas (often misspelled Americana or Americauna) or Araucanas.

Again, thank you very much Michael for the info. Now it makes a lot of sense.

Olekushka123 said:

Again, thank you very much Michael for the info. Now it makes a lot of sense.

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You're welcome.

These are my two Ameraucana boys..



and



and while i won't disagree there are a rainbow of Easter Eggers colours one is rather common this brown/red patterned one, i own 3 variations of it... 2 are pictured below.(hen in middle also an EE)