Araucana...Easter Egger Leg Color question

[cashdl]

With araucana's it is preferable to use a broody to hatch eggs. Broodies do much better because the araucana embryo's are so delicate. You should check out my website also. I have lots of pictures of my birds and quite a few links with info on the Araucana.

I use an incubator 1/2 the time but the hens definately do a better job and I get a better hatch rate.

Lanae

 

[Crickett B]

Quote:
Yup, that's what he has turned out to be...lol
You are GOOD at this

How in the heck did you do it? What made him stand out to be a boy?
Everyone's legs have turned colors too. They are darker, like a grey

Crickett

 

[BlacksheepCardigans]

Quote:
I completely disagree that EEs can have any color leg; some people persist in saying that any mixed-lineage chicken is an EE but that's really not true. You can't get EEs by breeding anything and everything; they are their own landrace and Ameraucanas came out of them, not the other way around.

Most hatchery EEs will eventually have willow (green) or slate legs. I'd give these guys a few more days to color in, but I'd also check to see if they have single or pea combs. If they're single combed, they're probably going to grow up to be a bearded mix that will lay brown eggs. Those tend to have yellow or light legs as well.

In the gamey-colored/wild-colored EEs the lightest chipmunk chicks tend to be males because the silver gene is sex-linked. The girls grow up to be a partridge-y color and the boys grow up to have silver hackles and saddles. If the hatchery has light-colored EEs or has mixed their EEs with something else, or has managed to breed out the silver, the light chicks anybody's guess. I would not want anybody to get rid of a light-chipmunk chick because they assume it MUST be a boy.

Oh, and tufts in Araucanas are not feathers. They're a fleshy peduncle that forms because the chick's developing ear doesn't grow correctly. They're actually a kind of head deformity and are lethal in homozygous and some heterozygous chicks. That's why I personally am not interested in them as a breed, not because they look odd. Silkies are a lot odder looking than any Araucana

. I believe the fight over whether it's ethical to breed tufted birds has raged for decades even within the Araucana club.

 

[Crickett B]

Quote:
Their legs all turned to a darker color about at a week old or so.
I am keeping him.

He will be my second EE boy. Now as usual, I have to find more girls as I now I have 7 girls and the two males.
Looks like my males may have alot of white in them, with red leakage. Not sure yet, as they are only 3 months and a tad over a month now.

 

[kristip]

Quote:
I completely disagree that EEs can have any color leg; some people persist in saying that any mixed-lineage chicken is an EE but that's really not true. You can't get EEs by breeding anything and everything; they are their own landrace and Ameraucanas came out of them, not the other way around.

Most hatchery EEs will eventually have willow (green) or slate legs. I'd give these guys a few more days to color in, but I'd also check to see if they have single or pea combs. If they're single combed, they're probably going to grow up to be a bearded mix that will lay brown eggs. Those tend to have yellow or light legs as well.

In the gamey-colored/wild-colored EEs the lightest chipmunk chicks tend to be males because the silver gene is sex-linked. The girls grow up to be a partridge-y color and the boys grow up to have silver hackles and saddles. If the hatchery has light-colored EEs or has mixed their EEs with something else, or has managed to breed out the silver, the light chicks anybody's guess. I would not want anybody to get rid of a light-chipmunk chick because they assume it MUST be a boy.

Oh, and tufts in Araucanas are not feathers. They're a fleshy peduncle that forms because the chick's developing ear doesn't grow correctly. They're actually a kind of head deformity and are lethal in homozygous and some heterozygous chicks. That's why I personally am not interested in them as a breed, not because they look odd. Silkies are a lot odder looking than any Araucana

. I believe the fight over whether it's ethical to breed tufted birds has raged for decades even within the Araucana club.

Please clarify for me, as I am splitting a box of EE with another person in march. baby EE look like the chipminks- correct? And if I am digging to make sure I am getting the pullets, I want the darker ones? What other features do you look for in a day or two old that might help?

 

[Crickett B]

Quote:
All your fingers and toes crossed too. I can NEVER pick out just girls. But getting better as with this batch I only had one boy and 5 girls

 

[Illia]

The chick I said to be a boy I considered so because that eyeliner, in the area it is, and the general color of the chick, usually grows to be a cockerel. Easter Eggers are rather easy to color-sex, and most EE cockerels start out a very light chipmunk color with a good black line at the eye, then turn a golden duckwing with some possible splash or white coloration mixed in. The very light color as a chick indicates this color because what you're seeing is the "golden" color, which females cannot carry. (both gold and silver genes)

 

[kristip]

so what typically do the females look like... just darker chipmunks with the eyeliner still?

thanks for your help. This does help me alot

 

[Oboistonquack]

THESE ARE ADORABLE!!! Very nice pics!!