Ameraucana thread for posting pictures and discussing our birds

[DMRippy]

Quote: Good luck with your hatch!!!

The feathers hadn't started to come in yet when I took that pic, but the down looks different on different chicks. Some have very light chipmunk markings on their down. Here's a pic from yesterday:

I can tell whether they are wheaten or blue wheaten by the wing feathers already.
Something is not right in the wood pile...... wheatens should NOT have that chipmunk strip.......

 

[johnderosa1]

Something is not right in the wood pile...... wheatens should NOT have that chipmunk strip....... 

Yeah i was just ready to type uh-oh... I hate to bring up the dreaded ee...., but..

 

[pips&peeps]

Some lines of wheatens do have little dots on them. Since your chicks have very obvious stripes, I would mark those two and probably not use them for breeding.

 

[johnderosa1]

Some lines of wheatens do have little dots on them.  Since your chicks have very obvious stripes, I would mark those two and probably not use them for breeding.

Could you elaborate a little here. My understanding is that silvers were the only chicks that should have chipmunk stripes... If some of these are showing clear stripes wouldn't you be worried about was is in the background of the others ? Just wondering where to draw the line. Thanks.

 

[lwente]

It is amazing to me how beautiful pure breeds are, nothing like the mutt EE breeds you get from the hatcheries or feed stores. I especially love the blue ones. Great job everyone!

 

[jan12]

Something is not right in the wood pile...... wheatens should NOT have that chipmunk strip....... 

I didn't know they can't have different down. Does that really matter if/when the feather color and everything else is correct when they are fully grown?

 

[jerryse]

Hmmmm It would not let me quote. This is for jan12. Yes chick color does matter as it indicates what genes are at work. I will try to explain. There is no difference in color on males in BB red and wheaten. The difference is the female color. BB red are wild type chipmunk striped. Wheaten chicks are yellow with a sometimes small dark dot on the head. As adults your partially striped males are undistinguishable from
true wheaten males. The striped females will show varying degrees of BB red female coloring. Sort of intermediate color between the 2 hen colors. These you can usually notice. To keep your color line from degrading you need to not breed breed from the striped chicks. They are fine for the layer or EE pen.

 

[jan12]

Some lines of wheatens do have little dots on them.  Since your chicks have very obvious stripes, I would mark those two and probably not use them for breeding.

Thanks - I will do that. This is my first time hatching wheaten/blue wheatens, and I did not know the stripes were bad.

 

[jan12]

Hmmmm It would not let me quote. This is for jan12. Yes chick color does matter as it indicates what genes are at work. I will try to explain. There is no difference in color on males in BB red and wheaten. The difference is the female color. BB red are wild type chipmunk striped. Wheaten chicks are yellow with a sometimes small dark dot on the head. As adults your partially striped males are undistinguishable from
true wheaten males. The  striped females will show varying degrees of BB red female coloring. Sort of intermediate color between the 2 hen colors. These you can usually notice. To keep your color line from degrading you need to not breed breed from the striped chicks. They are fine for the layer or EE pen.

I see. Thanks for the explanation! I will cull them from the breeding stock.

 

[draye]

It is amazing to me how beautiful pure breeds are, nothing like the mutt EE breeds you get from the hatcheries or feed stores. I especially love the blue ones. Great job everyone!

I beg to differ. The "Mutts" as you call the ever Beautiful EE, are some of the most beautiful of all chickens.