Ameraucana blue x lavender.. why or why not?

[KhalSancho]

So.. I’ve been scouring and still can’t find a clear answer.. I’ve raised chooks before but this will be our first attempt at breeding and I want to get it right..

Why is it that you don’t want to breed blue to lavender? Does it weaken genes? Is it just because of the colour they produce (if so what is it)? What happens and why or why shouldn’t you do it? Asking because my Ameraucana Roo is blue and MY BEST structured hens are all lavender and I want to keep towards breeding for correct structure. But if blue x lav will be to my detriment, I’ll have to try n find a POL blue or black?

 

[Egghead_Jr]

It's just that they are different colors/genes. There is a lot of confusion when it comes to Lavender aka self blue. It's not Blue. I don't know much about breeding Lavender other than black is used to correct feather quality. My hope is you are going to create a blue flock. With that you must keep an eye on lacing, work to improve it. Consider the lavender hens as if they are black. The blue to (black) will beget blue and black chicks and darken the shade of blue.

I should edit to add all chicks will also be split for lavender which mean if you mate the F1 bird onto themselves next year half the birds will be lavender. I'd weed them out and stick with Blue, work on lacing. To avoid continual crossing of Lav and Blue for generations to come choose the K and few pullets with most lacing to move forward. Lav. does not have lace so you know it's Blue. Continue each year after with blue lace mated to blue lace, F3, F4 generations. The Lavender will be weeded out and you'll be improving SOP of Blue.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

The problem is split lav moving forward. I edited my first post to shed some light on that.

 

[keesmom]

Do you plan to breed the F1 offspring back to your blue male or breed them together? If you breed them together you can get black/blue/splash as well as blue/splash lavender. A bird can be both lavender and blue, and it can be tough to tell those apart from the ones that are just blue.

 

[AusHen]

I work with Lavender Araucana, nothing worse than finding a blue. Same as blues, having lavender pop up from a blue black splash pen can be a real headache. If you do mix them and plan to sell eggs/birds please make is very clear to buyers that the colours have been mixed

 

[NNYchick]

Do you have a book of poultry standards of perfection for your country? If you want to breed I highly recommend it. This will describe the visual difference that you look for in each color. Not only that but it will help you choose which birds meet breed type and help you wean out any defects or faults that would make the bird inferior for the breed.

 

[NNYchick]

I’m not sure about your country, but for the Americans poultry standards are copyright so you might find bits and pieces of someone’s interpretation of it but not the whole standard.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

It will be a little difficult as the two colors (blue and Lav.) can be challenging to tell apart to many people. But it's really not that hard excepting very light blue Blue birds will look like Lavender. That said those birds are poor examples of Blue color so would be culled out with lavender birds anyway.

The standard for Blue is slate blue or another way to visualize it is Pigeon Blue. Lavender is dull grey, no two ways about it. Poor Blue color can look like that hence the difficulty in distinction. What I was saying is Blue has lacing or edging if you will on feather tips. Lavender does not. The standard for all Blue is for lacing and this variety for all breeds needs improvement in lacing. Going forward always use Blue with as much lacing as you can get and that guarantees you are mating Blue.

As for the genetics of what's going on you are starting with Lav and BLue. Lav gene requires both loci to be Lav to express. Blue varieties hatch out Black (no Blue gene), Blue (one blue gene) and Splash (two blue genes). Your F1 generation, first hatch from this pairing, will hatch out 50% black birds and 50% birds expressing blue. All of them will carry one gene of Lavender meaning they are split for Lav.

Mating the best laced blue birds of F1, don't use the parent cock as you feel his body type is lacking, will beget F2 generation. As each F1 bird carries one copy of Lav this will result in 25% offspring carrying no Lav, 25% will express Lav as they have two copies and 50% will still be split for lavender- carry one copy of gene. As you can see it's going to take generations to weed out the Lav completely. But by F4 generation you'll have keeper birds from previous generations. with test matings you'll be able to determine who is carrying lav and who is not. I'm confident you will eliminate that gene from flock in at most 5 generations.

BTW, that K (cockerel) you were holding in photo is Blue. I saw a splash in a photo too. Are any of those birds in photo suppose to be Lavender? I don't see any.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

Post #14;

Photo 1- Blue,
Photo 2 & 3- Lavender
Photo 4- Black
Photo 5 & 7- Blue

Photo 6 is shadowed but you can see Lav now I think.

In post #5 the third photo down bird to right is Splash. You will have blue leakage in splash birds, kind of mottled look of not quite white bird with patches of blue.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

My bad. I meant to say the bird to left in photo not the bird to the right or center. Those two are blue.

ANywho, if you search about here or online you'll get some tips on breeding the blue variety. I'll give you a quick nitty gritty on it now-

You should always use at least one bird in a pairing that is expressing Blue (one copy). Using all blue expressing birds for mating is prefered but not always a possibility. If you have a black or splash with excellent type or other attribute you want/need by all means use it. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Improving body type is paramount when working toward the standard of perfection.

I'd stated earlier the importance of improving lacing. The two reasons you want to use at least one blue color bird in pairing is you can see the lacing on blue, you can't see it on black birds and unless lacing gene is strong in your flock you wont see it in splash birds either. Without using at least one blue in mating you could loose the lacing gene in flock all together. By using both blue with best lacing you are improving it.

To maintain or improve on the shade of blue you should use at least one blue bird in pairing and again better to use both. The shading will vary greatly in all offspring until you have worked on it well in flock. Use birds that are closed to desired shade or complement each other to obtain desired shade of blue. A dark blue to light blue with produce a range from that dark color to light with most being about middle of range. The closer those two shades of blue are the more offspring will be correct color making for more choices for other attributes in next mating. Blue is a hard variety to get right and not the easiest variety to maintain.

After generations of blue to blue the color will continue to lighten. A black bird of excellent type is used to darken up the blue again. So again, if you've a great type black use it. Breed it to a lighter great type blue. There is a finesse to it you'll gain with experience hands on. Seeing for yourself what results from certain pairings.

The biggest problem with blue variety is "breeders" want more blue expression so they mate splash to black to have all blue offspring. This is a mistake. They will all be blue expression (no gene mated to 2 genes results all carrying one gene which expresses blue). The problem with this is one- you don't know the quality of lacing in either parent and two- the offspring will be the entire range of blue shade, from light grey to dark blue. So you didn't really aid your cause in a mating like that. But again, if they are spectacular in every other regard then by all means use them. Just try to mate them to a complementing blue bird. Mate black to lighter blue and mate splash to darker blue.

Ok, that was a bit more than a "nut shell" of advise on how to breed blue variety. Hope it helps.

Good Luck!