Ameraucana color genetics

[honeybird farms]

I know that this has been discussed somewhere generally, but hoping for response to this specific situation. Sorry if I posted in the wrong spot - feel free to redirect me!

I have a few Ameraucana from a local show breeder. Now, I knew when buying that these were her non-chosen birds (she only took a few of the best, sold the rest). I'm not breeding to show, but for quality backyard Ameraucana (make sense?!) - I'd never sell my birds for show, but I don't want to raise EE (no offense to anyone, just what I'm trying to do).

So...my birds are all black. Originally I started with a blue roo and a black. Had a couple of fairly dark blues come out but I wasn't happy with the results and unfortunately all the blues turned out to be Roos (why?!). Skip to today... I culled the extra
Roos and kept the black. Now I have one black Roo and a few black pullets. I have been hatching black chicks. Simple.

However, I just ran two hatches with maybe 10 chicks each. And imagine my surprise when the first chick popped out a very pale blue and yellow. I thought maybe some of the blue had been kept in the line and I had a splash? Except she feathered out completely white. Imagine even more surprise when 3 more whites and (I think really this time) a nice blue blue out. The breeder did have whites,blacks, and blues so it is obviously possible (unfortunate?) that somewhere that got crossed.

What the heck is going on? First, I kinda understand genetics and I'd assume my roo and one hen (who maybe only recently started really liking each other) both have a recessive white? But, how likely is that to express so often? Does that now mean they're EE since they're probably below the 50% mark for breeding true to color (this rule always confuses me, because if those two were to be placed with a different mate they wouldn't have the other needed white so they'd breed true black and then they'd be Standard again? Is that right?)

Are whites that have been produced from blacks considered inferior? Is that a bad thing? Should I just retire the whole group and start over?! This seems too complicated for breeding simple black birds! *sigh*

Thanks for any help or wisdom you can provide!

Lisa

 

[1muttsfan]

Recessive white can take a long time to ferret out and get rid of. If you want to breed only black, or blue-black-splash birds, you will have to find the culprits, or get different stock. Obviously your rooster is suspect.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid_white_(chicken_plumage)

Breeding out recessive white

http://forum.backyardpoultry.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=8026726

If you plan on only raising birds for yourself and not sell them as black Ams, then you can decide for yourself how much it bothers you.

Since Blue is partially dominant to Black, you cannot get Blue birds out of 2 black parents - BBS genetics (post #3)

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/266426/blue-black-splash-genes

 

[honeybird farms]

Ok, so I've done a ton of reading and I need to cull the rooster and the suspect hen to get the white out if I don't want to have whites.

I am now getting about 2/10 chicks that are very white at birth or a smoky grey color (the first smoky grey chick was the one I originally thought was going to be blue or splash, thinking maybe I actually had a really dark blue in there. It feathered out white). Any idea why the difference in the chick down?

Are whites that are created this way (ie, 2 black parents) inherently bad? (ie, undesirable as SWA)

And then, completely off that topic...

Would they work as the Am for an Olive Egger project? Thinking of putting them with Blue Copper Marans and theoretically the chicks would take on the Marans color, right? No? Thoughts?