The Ameraucana Thread: Where everything and anything about the breed can be discussed (APA, Non-Stan

[lualshannon]

Wonderful idea for a thread. I'm proud to join in. Not all of my Amies are purebred, but that doesn't give them any less value to me.

I love my blue-bottomed Olive Egger girls, and am always experimenting with different combos to get different EE's from them. Nothing quite as pretty as a Black Sparkle or Blue Bottom EE. I am currently breeding a pure white EE bearded Hen with a white Polish Tophat Roo to try to get a white chicken with a beard and hippy hair that lays blue eggs. hahaha! I Hope these eggs hatch and produce the desired result!

Also, I went to the link that you posted: 3/4 of my Amies are colored perfectly like what I see for those appropriate colors, so I guess (since they were sold to me as Amies) and they meet the SOP, that means that they are Amies and not EE's? Who woulda thunk it?

What is a Blue Bottom, and Black Sparkle EE? Both patterns? have an adorable name.

 

[salt and pepper]

I do love her, except for being a little piggy, she doesn't have any faults lol, she lays five to six eggs a week, and started at around 25 weeks. She is a little shier because I got her when she was older, but that's ok =) I have my first two EEs in the brooder right now, I love how they are coloring out, one is lavender mottled with brown, and the other is brown, and white barred, then I have the mystery chick, that is pure white so far. They are with their barred rock buddies, that I have also fallen in love with.

 

[BuffyGRL]

Had my first 3 hatch in the barred/cuckoo project.More in the bator.Roll the dice and see what I get.My barred cockerel still has slate legs at 7 months.

That great Jerry. I have some larger cuckoo cockerels I hope to use to get size up. I am still working on leg color. I have 2 cuckoo and 2 Lav cuckoo pullets laying. Just can't decide what roo to use. I have a black Lav split and the 2 huge cuckoo and Lav cuckoo guys from Amy but I don't know if they will be too rough on the girls.

 

[Outrun Acres]

Good Morning, Outrun Acres,

I am very happy that you have started a positive, welcoming thread where your members can share their experiences, talk about their adored and loved birds without fear and hindrances. I am simply delighted to be a member of your wonderful thread. With a person such as yourself, I am sure it will be a successful thread where everyone will feel joy of being part of it.

Thank you!

I think one of the best things about on-line forums, is that no one can see you blush! You are too kind! I would love to hear more about your birds and see more pictures of them. Thank you for joining the thread!

 

[ParamtPoultry]

Can anyone post photos of a show quality breeding pair of wheaten Ameracaunas? Thank you

 

[Outrun Acres]

I do love her, except for being a little piggy, she doesn't have any faults lol, she lays five to six eggs a week, and started at around 25 weeks. She is a little shier because I got her when she was older, but that's ok =) I have my first two EEs in the brooder right now, I love how they are coloring out, one is lavender mottled with brown, and the other is brown, and white barred, then I have the mystery chick, that is pure white so far. They are with their barred rock buddies, that I have also fallen in love with.

Your brooder sounds very similar to ours right now. My husband and I had difficulty agreeing on what breeds we wanted to try out this year, so we each bought our own. We came home with 5 EE's (what I wanted) and 2 Dominiques and 2 Cuckoo Marans (what he wanted). In all honesty I wanted them all but thought we were only going to get a couple so thought I would make sure my EE's were for sure in the box. My husband wants a colorful backyard flock and some birds with good table qualities. Next on his list are buckeyes. I personally, want to dive a bit deeper and think the direction I want to head toward is breeding Ameraucanas. My boys are too young to be in 4-H right now but I thought it would be fun to start a breeding project that in the future they could be a part of and maybe show some birds. I have an Animal Science degree and I partook in a lot of enterprise projects (lots having to do with genetics) and I really miss working on a project. I think I have done my research on the breed and am ready to get started. (That is, once we build another coup and runs to keep the birds in their breeding groups). Housing for the animals always seems to be the clincher .

 

[Outrun Acres]

Can anyone post photos of a show quality breeding pair of wheaten Ameracaunas? Thank you

Hello, and welcome to the thread! I personally don't have any pictures of a show quality breeding pair of wheaten Ameraucanas. But there are some good pictures of birds that at least are the approved APA color on the ABC site. We have some other long-time breeders on this thread. They may have some pictures they will be able to post to give you a good visual representation of type as well. Here is the link to the scrapbook page on the ABC site.

http://www.ameraucana.org/scrapbook.html

 

[my sunwolf]

I am really interested in this thread, as I'm just taking the plunge into buying PB Ameraucanas for breeding purposes. We're currently doing EE's and Olive Eggers with the boy below:



He's a Blue that got gold leakage in the hackle and saddles. He also has dark brown eyes, but I can't really figure out if eye color is part of the SOP. Does anyone know if the leakage speaks badly of his lineage? The breeder who sold him to me really wanted to make sure I didn't think I was going to be able to breed Ameraucanas with him. He also has some brown tones to his blue, which is definitely not good. So far he's just here to cross over my Easter Eggers and brown egg layers for some cute blue and green egg laying mutts.

Of course, last week I drove and picked up some PB BBS Ameraucanas bred from Blue stock:




Aren't they pretty? (See that boy down in front?)

When I got them home, I figured out why I got them for such a deal: there is crossbeak in the lines. I've already had to cull one chick, and it's looking like I'll have to cull another. I thought it might be nutrition problems, but on a high protein feed they haven't improved. Didn't even think to check for that when buying them, and didn't notice it until I got them home. Ah, well. Just one more reason to buy from reputable breeders.

When these kids grow up, the pullets will be bred to a Black Ameraucana rooster from a different flock to produce a lot of blues. The boys will be bred to my Easter Eggers and, eventually, to their "neices." We'll do line breeding until I get serious enough that I want to purchase really incredible stock to cross back into the flock.

The project color I am most interested in: Blue Laced Red Ameraucanas. Concerned that, to do that kind of a project, you'd have to breed in brown egg layers, and so to get back to blue eggs, you'd then worry about only selecting for egg color while other traits (health, weight, eye color, leg color, etc) declined. So, you'd have to have a pretty large selection of birds to do the breeding with, more so than doing a project color where you can breed in a white egg layer.

 

[jerryse]

Yes, he was very honest, we just expected blue eggs ( we saw his nests, and they were ALL blue) We still love our bird, she has been a great addition to our flock.

This can happen once in a while even with good breeders.I think John reported this happening to him last year.I currently have 2 blue wheaten pullets.The first on to lay has laid a cream tinted egg.Hope the other one lays blue.Excellent bloodline.In poultry terms ameraucanas are a fairly new breed.Still some recessive genes popping up.Wyandoters and sebrites still throw single combs on occasion.

 

[TW1Kell]

What is a Blue Bottom, and Black Sparkle EE? Both patterns? have an adorable name.

This is Blue Bottom. I bought her as an Olive Egger, and she lays an olive drab, brown speckled egg that is green inside. One of my favorite hens.


This was Sparkle. I got the name from a picture that stated the Hen was a perfect sparkle. My Sparkle, ahd the white specks, all over her. They weren't visible in my phone cam shot. She was killed by a neighbor's dog a few weeks ago. She was the 1st chicken hatched on my place, and I was really looking forward to seeing what she wouyld have , chick-wise. She laid a beautiful, large blue egg, not turquoise, but true blue. She is from an EE Roo (my avatar) and one of my EE Hens (?). She had lacing and penciling on each feather, that was silvery grey, but all you see in this pic is a brownish tint to her. She wasn't brown, tho.