- Oct 24, 2014
- 32
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I wasn’t sure where to post this, so I thought the general area was best.
I have come across something that I find extremely frustrating.
A while ago I posted a picture of my “Lavender” Orpington, asking what she was. She looks and acts just like a Lavender but she lays a blueish, green/grey egg. I know from all my reading that Orpington’s do not lay that color of an egg, ever.
So I accepted that perhaps she was an isolated incident and somehow her mom got crossed with someone she shouldn’t have.
Since I have posted that discussion, I have come across literally a dozen different people with Lavender Orpington flocks that all lay that same strange easter egg. Now keep in mind all these people live in Western Washington, in very close proximity to each other. That got me thinking. This person I purchased my chick from advertised regularly all over this area. Most people that have chicken breeds of a rare, heritage, or unusual nature have heard of this gentleman and have purchased from him or know someone who has.
My theory: This guy made up this line of Lavender Orpington. Which would have been fine, if he had used other Orpingtons but clearly he tossed something in there that has attributed to the funky egg color. I wouldn’t mind someone selling chicks as Lavender like or mixed breed etc… but this guy sold those chicks, all of them, as pure bred and for a lot of money!
So yesterday I came across a women with her Lavender Orp flock that is convinced she has a pure line. She even incubates and sells them as such. So, she like many of the others I have found, are passing off mixed breed mutts as pure, and continuing to contaminate the rest of the pure population.
On a preservation stand point I am appalled, I find it to be careless and inappropriate. Maybe I am too stuck up, but I like the idea of keeping lines pure. That doesn’t mean I am not all for tossing some new unrelated Orpington genes in there on occasion to keep healthy diversity; however, these aren’t Opringtons!
So perhaps as a heads up to others, don’t buy these chickens as anything other than a mixed breed and if you have any of these birds, maybe you want to think twice before you continue to sell them as pure.
I have come across something that I find extremely frustrating.
A while ago I posted a picture of my “Lavender” Orpington, asking what she was. She looks and acts just like a Lavender but she lays a blueish, green/grey egg. I know from all my reading that Orpington’s do not lay that color of an egg, ever.
So I accepted that perhaps she was an isolated incident and somehow her mom got crossed with someone she shouldn’t have.
Since I have posted that discussion, I have come across literally a dozen different people with Lavender Orpington flocks that all lay that same strange easter egg. Now keep in mind all these people live in Western Washington, in very close proximity to each other. That got me thinking. This person I purchased my chick from advertised regularly all over this area. Most people that have chicken breeds of a rare, heritage, or unusual nature have heard of this gentleman and have purchased from him or know someone who has.
My theory: This guy made up this line of Lavender Orpington. Which would have been fine, if he had used other Orpingtons but clearly he tossed something in there that has attributed to the funky egg color. I wouldn’t mind someone selling chicks as Lavender like or mixed breed etc… but this guy sold those chicks, all of them, as pure bred and for a lot of money!
So yesterday I came across a women with her Lavender Orp flock that is convinced she has a pure line. She even incubates and sells them as such. So, she like many of the others I have found, are passing off mixed breed mutts as pure, and continuing to contaminate the rest of the pure population.
On a preservation stand point I am appalled, I find it to be careless and inappropriate. Maybe I am too stuck up, but I like the idea of keeping lines pure. That doesn’t mean I am not all for tossing some new unrelated Orpington genes in there on occasion to keep healthy diversity; however, these aren’t Opringtons!
So perhaps as a heads up to others, don’t buy these chickens as anything other than a mixed breed and if you have any of these birds, maybe you want to think twice before you continue to sell them as pure.
