Araucana thread anyone?

[cashdl]

I have a question for anyone that has had this problem. All my roos are rumpless, one has 4 tail feathers. All my hens are rumpless. I have hatched approximately 90 chicks this year and none with tails till this fall. All the sudden I am getting partial and full tails everywhere. Same pens all summer. I didn't change pens around till about 1 week ago. Course as luck would have it I am getting tufts with tails oh and duckwings. All summer I wanted duckwings, nothing. About 3 weeks ago poof duckwings and bbrs hatching everywhere and tails. URGH!!!!

My pens are seperated and covered. No chance of a sly roo getting in. I am trying to figure out what changed.


Lanae

 

[exoticduckluvr]

Shaffer I have 9 or more Tufted bird on the way to me now. I hadn't planned on breeding, just wanted some nice ones for pets. I am disabled due to major back surgery, RA, and a Blood Clotting Disease. I rarely leave the house unless I have to. I just try to be happy here with my animals because tomorrow may never come for me one day. I survived throwing a really bad blood clot to the intestines in 2006 that they could find no reason for. They did genetic testing and found it A Prothrombin Factor Mutation

 

[Shaffer]

exoticduckluvr,
Well good luck with your new batch of Araucanas. If this is the only chickens you have free ranging you will be breeding because they are good broody hens. I had an Araucana which I gave her 25 chicks to raise but I had an Ameraucana that fostered 50 chicks after another hen and her I put in the same pen together ignored them. The Ameraucana took over all 50 chicks but they were not day old they were about 3 weeks old. Those Araucanas should definately go broody for you and you will have some offsprings.
Sorry to hear about your condition, some of us don't really know how lucky we really are. Take care and enjoy your hobby.

 

[wilds of pa]

***Donna Pm returned

Fugly is a very pretty hen, i don't recommend culling her, esp if you eat eggs then you got a brown egg layer there.

if penned with other blue laying araucana you know which her eggs are. you'll just wanna make sure your roo's from that same line are not contributing the brown gene, thats if your planning to propagate them further.
Araucana are not the most difficult birds to have on your farm, hatching can be tricky if you don't breed them properly. yes you get tails, rumpless, clean faced and tufted. but its what makes them so fun.

not everybody wants or desires to go to shows,
thats not what chickens are about for the majority of us, its about good eating eggs and meat (knowing were your food comes from) and nice looking birds cruising around the farm for that easy relaxing feeling one gets from it, i know i personally do, plus improving your lines always is fun to..

anybody that doesn't own any araucana (Bantam or LF) really should think about having some, their history is very interesting to..

couple quick pic's

 

[key west chick]

If anybody ever has any LF lavender pullet culls, please let me know. I would love 2 more. Doesnt matter if they are tufted, not, or tailed. For my own flock and not breeding to sell. Mean DH wont let me buy eggs until spring.

 

[wilds of pa]

I may have a few laying lavender pullets/Young hens available soon, they are completely rumpless. been laying for a couple months now, just undecided on which ones yet as they all have different personality's, all are great looking birds to. I'm thinking of pairing them up with young lavender cockerels that are partial tailed or fully tailed but all tufted(double and singles).

I don't suspect you will find them anywhere else in this country other than right here at this time, i know by next year there will be more breeders out there with them as the eggs and my extra birds are getting out there now.

 

[smoothmule]

Exoticduckluvr,
I wholeheartedly agree with several others here. The Araucana is not expected to be easy to breed for type anytime soon, maybe never. I feel that the gene pool is too small to just cull any of them that aren't perfect, you'll finally end up with zero birds

It's not that there aren't really good, really correct Araucana's that lay blue eggs, there are some really good ones but what I have learned is that what you don't usually see is the volume of them hatched to get that perfection (not to mention the number that don't even hatch). So, that can be erroneously interpreted as having a lot of throw away birds but not for me, I planned for it. I already know that I will have far more birds that do not meet that perfection and those birds must also be part of the plan. My own opinion is that this means I have to be open to learning everything I can about the breed from the beak to the toes and be okay with the risks as well as the benefits without having expectations that are too high and just enjoy them and learn. I don't show. It looks like a lot of fun but I really don't have anything show quality at this point anyway. I'm more than likely going to sell any that I produce that are show quality to someone who would show them (after I have some chicks out of them) unless I get the bug to show but I would seriously be just as elated to see someone win with one of my Araucana's or a bloodline I have put together. That would be success to me.

I must be a glutton for punishment because my other favorite breed is the Serama, which is equally as frustrating if you let them. I think that, in a nutshell, that if someone looks at this breed as rare and expensive and the plan is to make some cash, those breeders will be sadly disappointed and I always worry about the risk of even more bloodlines out of the breeding pool. However, if you like the breed (and I do) and you can tolerate more failure than fame (and I can, rephrased - I don't feel any of them are a failure) and feel that the breed is worth the challenges, then you'll be fine with them. Otherwise, I think it's just a waste of time and resources. My percentages for any number of really nice birds will even be less that for many other breeders since I won't have that many total but I feel I will contribute and I'm having a darned good time at it (meaning I've learned a lot and met some very cool people as a result).

 

[cackleberrycoop]

I am so sorry that you got a brown egg; I KNOW the disappointment of waiting for that pretty colored egg and just getting another brown. It really is painful. Sorry. I know that they pop up out of the blue every once in a while out of even the most closed and established lines of blue egg birds. I was reading over on the Ameraucana breeders thread once when one of the most respected and well known breeders around wrote that he was stunned that morning to find a brown egg in his pullet pen, out of a bird that had come from generations of blue eggs and proven breeding birds on both sides!!!
Now, as to your brown egg layer there, I know that you do not plan to breed so it's a bit of a moot point, bit if she were mine (and I think she is beautiful) I would never breed with her. For me, the blue egg trait is so key to the uniqueness of the Araucanas, that it sort of trumps a lot of other characteristics. I'm not interested in show quality birds if it means loosing, or weakening the egg color of the line.

 

[pips&peeps]

I would consider culling (not using for breeding) that wheaten hen if I were starting out with araucanas myself since #1 she is laying a brown egg and #2 she has the wrong skin color.

She obviously has white skin, you can tell by how bright blue the shanks are, they should be more green. Araucanas are supposed to have yellow skin. The white skin gene is dominant and you will end up with more babies that are white skinned than with yellow skin from her.

I think you could probably get a better breeder even if it were tailed and clean faced to start out with. I think you have given her an appropriate name and don't see any endearing qualities about her that would be usefull for breeding besides the fact she is rumpless.

Of course I am not a breeder of araucanas and my opinion has little value. I would put a picture of her over at the araucana club forum and ask Steve Waters about her. Tell him I sent you.

 

[wilds of pa]

she looks cool to me, she looks like a buff project araucana.
probably bred from a bantam buff Americana x araucana x bantam buff orp or buff silkie lines at one time or another,
but you could still work with her if you wanted to as cashdl
said which would work,
there are alot of white skinned araucana around some even shown with it. yes they should have yellow skin. i must say after many years with araucana, never ever had a brown egg pop up yet to date and ive raised alot of them.