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- #21
So question here. Seeing as an Olive Egger (which is actually an EE and not a specific breed but a cross) is a hen that lays greenish blue eggs, so can a roo really be called an Olive Egger since they don't lay eggs? To clarify, can the genes for the olive egg color come from the roo? How I understand it is 1 parent carries a gene for dark brown egg color and the other carries a blue egg gene and the resulting female offspring from the pairing will lay olive colored eggs and can be called Olive Eggers. Would the roos and hens from that cross (first generation olive eggers) pass along a gene for olive egg color to their offspring Hope this doesn't sound too confusing..lol!
blue egg gene hen--- Olive Egger hen--
I -----Olive Egger offspring I---- olive egger offspring?
brown egg rooster--- Olive Egger roo?-- (or too watered down so
blue or brown egg gene is
lost resulting in either
brown or blue eggs but no
olive eggs?)
Guess what I am asking is does the olive egg color breed true if you cross 2 olive eggers or is that only a first generation trait? And can a roo from the initial pairing be called an Olive Egger?Or am i just totally confused about all of this? Rofl!
Haha, quite a few questions there! Ok I will do my best to answer them from the little I know. So truthfully I can't see why an EE would be any more of a breed than an OE. They both can be produced from a variety of breeds. EEs have a peacomb and therefore should lay a blue or green egg. OEs should also have a peacomb but since one parent carries the dark brown gene trait the blue green egg color SHOULD be darker with the next generation, leaning more towards olive. So let's use my bird as an example.
There was a splash Ameracuna (sp?) and a black Orpington. From them I hatched a blue female EE. I mated her with a White Marans (he hatched from dark brown, almost chocolate colored egg) the result was this bird. A splash looking OE. So technically he/she is an F1 Olive Egger. Regardless of if its a boy he is still an OE, his peacomb means he SHOULD carry that olive colored egg gene. His children mated with other olive Eggers would be an F2 Olive Egger. He had brothers who had a straight comb (like their father) I would not call him an OE though. His comb indicates he would pass a brown egg gene, not olive.
So I could be totally wrong (someone correct me if I am) but a lot of the name in both "breeds" seems to rely on that pea comb