Ameraucanas in a Nutshell (looking for pictures of Ameraucanas with defects and quality birds)

[RememberTheWay]

Picture- Two Bantam Ameraucana Chicks. One Blue and One Lavender Silver

Example Shown- Evaluation of Head Width on young chicks. This applies to any breeding program no matter the breed. Even hybrids. Evaluation of Head Width is important because it has been shown to correlate to width on the entire body. Wider pelvic widths give us better production and less reproductive disorders.

In this photo- pay attention to where the eyes are and how much of the eye can be seen from above looking down on them. The chick on right has more eyeball showing when viewed from above, which means it's skull (and body) are more narrow then the left chick where we see almost no eyeball from this angle.

The breed standard must also be taken into consideration especially with Ameraucana because nothing about an Ameraucana should be extreme- including head width. Everything in the standard points to a medium/moderate bird. Head widths are evaluated on a scale of 0-5 usually with 0 being super narrow and 5 being the extreme of wide. You don't want an Ameraucana to score a 5 in this or anything for that matter. When I say a scale of 1-5 I'm not talking about judging points, I'm simply talking about breeder evaluations and your personal scoring for your breeding and hatching records. Always remember everything is subjective and how we personally interpret the standard. For me- I would select towards a head width like the left chick. That chicks width is not the widest I've seen and I probably wouldn't want to select any wider the the left chick. I wouldn't want a chick to be any narrower then the right chick either though. IMHO- either chick is actually acceptable especially when beginning a program. If I had to choose though, the left would be my choice.

This photo also shows proper combs on chicks

More to come

 

[Sc_chickengirl]

Comb – Should be a small pea comb with 3 distinct ridges, the middle ridge being a bit taller than the outer ridges. The comb should be tidy, and attached low on a preferably wide head. Look for a nice broad comb because narrow combs tend to flop when they reach maturity. It should be higher in the middle then on the top or bottom. If you were to draw a straight line up from the birds eye that is where the comb should end; the comb should be flush with the skull. Males in this breed are required to have small combs; therefore it is usually best to breed with females that have very tiny combs; so tiny you can hardly make out the 3 distinct ridges.

However, good exhibition females are not always good for breeding and vice versa. In a good show female it is best to have a slightly larger comb, where you can make out the 3 distinct ridges and see it is a little higher middle then on the top or bottom. Females with larger combs will often throw cockerels with large or untidy combs which is not ideal.

I know some breeders do feel that the show and breeding birds should be able to be used for both…and I myself do agree with this sentiment, at least in one way. I know not all my birds would not do well at a show but the ones I pick out to show will also be used in my breeding pen.

The comb counts for 5 points according the general scale of points. Regarding shape of the comb for pea comb breeds the standard mentions as defects:

Comb foreign to breed or variety.

Lopped below horizontal plane of top of skull.

Telescoped.

And what is a telescoped comb? Well I have not been able to find much on it but I did find one picture that I found helpful. But I would describe as a indention at the top of the comb that stays flat and circular while the rest of the comb is as it is supposed to be.
The top 8 pictures are good examples of what the pea comb should look like.
The bottom 4 are all defects.
1. Cockerel has a straight comb which is 'foreign to the breed or variety'
2. Large, messy, and not flush with the skull.
3. Large, not flush with the skull.
4. Same faults as the one above.

 

[Sc_chickengirl]

Please give me your opinion on my evaluation of what the comb should look like and the examples I have used.
Also if any one has any examples of a telescoped comb and maybe a better way of explaining it...

 

[Sc_chickengirl]

Just going to leave this here for while we're talking about combs....this was my first time looking into the genes for it and I found it very interesting and really did learn. They're are 5 other comb types that are rather rare that I have not mentioned. I would consider these to be the 4 main comb types.
Genetics of combs (the little bit I understand)
A chickens comb type is determined by 2 genes: the rose comb (R) and the pea comb (P). If the letter representing the gene is present it will be a capital if is absent it will be lowercase. Both of these are dominant traits and can be heterogenous, meaning that only one dominant trait is required for it to be expressed in phenotype.
So a rose comb can be expressed as either: RRpp or Rrpp. The pea comb gene must be absent for it to be a rose comb.
A pea comb can be expressed as rrPP or rrPp. And the rose comb gene must be absent.
When both of these genes are represented together the result is a Walnut comb such as in a silkie. This comb can be expressed in 4 different ways: RRPP, RrPp, RrPP, and RRPp.
When both of the genes are absent you have your single comb expressed as rrpp.
So when it comes to breeding these comb types together...
(Hypathetically)
So lets say you take a Sebright (RRpp) that breeds true and carries no recessive comb type genes and you also have a bantam Ameraucana (rrPP) that also has no recessive genes: what would the outcome be?
Both of these genes are dominant so they would come to a compromise and form a Walnut Comb such as seen on a Silkie. The offspring of this breeding would not be true producers of walnut combs however because they would be carrying recessive genes.
So if you bred 2 offpspring of your Sebright x bantam Ameraucana cross then what would you end up with? These 2 birds could be RRPP, RrPp, RrPP or RRPp.
RRPP x RRPP = RRPP (dominate Walnut comb)
RRPP x RrPp = 25% RRPP (dominate), 25% RrPp, 25% RRPp (recessive for rose comb) 25% RrPP (recessive for pea comb) but all offspring have Walnut combs.
RRPP X RrPP = 75% RRPP (dominate), 25% RrPP (recessive for pea combs) but all would be Walnut combs.
RRPP X RRPp = 75% RRPP (dominate), 25% RRPp (recessive for rose combs) all would be Walnut combs.
RrPp x RrPp = 100% RrPp (recessive) Walnut combs.
RrPp x RrPP = 50% RrPp (recessive), 50% RrPP (recessive for pea combs)
RrPp x RRPp = RrPp (recessive), RRPp (recessive for rose comb)
RrPP x RrPP = 100% RrPP (recessive for pea comb)
RrPP x RRPp = 25% RrPP (recessive for pea comb), 25% RRPp (recessive for rose comb) 25% RrPp (recessive), and 25% RRPP (dominate).

Excuse my rambling just thought I would share this incase it interests anyone. I've never gone into the actually genetics, like a lot of people I just do what makes sense. If I have too big of a comb I breed it to a very small combed bird. In rosecombs I've bred a straightcomb to a rosecomb and 50% have been rosecombed and 50% straightcombed as expected. But I think its helpful to know the actually genetics especially if you are working on a project.